Very Computer

I've installed RH6.0 on my new e-machine and had
some problems with it.

Installation was fine, but while I was setting it
up, it froze. Eventually, I decided to run fsck
and found that some of the disk sectors were bad.
My first thought was to do a low-level format so
that these sectors get marked as 'bad'. After
going to Samsung's website, I found that there is
_no_ low level formatting once it leaves the
factory. The best bet was downloading cleanhdd.exe
(which, BTW, is only fully downloadable from their
non-english page ,Japanese?, Korean?) which
re-sets the drive back to factory settings, but
doesn't mark any bad sectors.

Without adding/replacing the HD, I don't know of
any alternatives.

Too bad....

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I've installed RH6.0 on my new e-machine and had
some problems with it.

Installation was fine, but while I was setting it
up, it froze. Eventually, I decided to run fsck
and found that some of the disk sectors were bad.
My first thought was to do a low-level format so
that these sectors get marked as 'bad'. After
going to Samsung's website, I found that there is
_no_ low level formatting once it leaves the
factory. The best bet was downloading cleanhdd.exe
(which, BTW, is only fully downloadable from their
non-english page ,Japanese?, Korean?) which
re-sets the drive back to factory settings, but
doesn't mark any bad sectors.

Without adding/replacing the HD, I don't know of
any alternatives.

Too bad....

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Share what you know. Learn what you don't.

It's new, therefore under warranty. If the hard drive is
screwed, take it back.

--
Donovan

If you really want to remain with that e-machine I'd recommend you
forget that Samsung HDD which anyway it's about 4 times slower
than any other HDD you can get a retail and go out and buy yourself
a brand new HDD and you'll never have problems again.E-machine will
just send you another crappy,subqualitty HDD-hey.it's cheap.
And by the way..set-up your Linux box so that it will go in sleep mode
over night or at least after 6-7 hours of use'cause the power supply
 is also substandard.(I've seen a lot
of HDD and PWR Supply problems with E and I mean A LOT).  

Quote:> I've installed RH6.0 on my new e-machine and had
> some problems with it.

> Installation was fine, but while I was setting it
> up, it froze. Eventually, I decided to run fsck
> and found that some of the disk sectors were bad.
> My first thought was to do a low-level format so
> that these sectors get marked as 'bad'. After
> going to Samsung's website, I found that there is
> _no_ low level formatting once it leaves the
> factory. The best bet was downloading cleanhdd.exe
> (which, BTW, is only fully downloadable from their
> non-english page ,Japanese?, Korean?) which
> re-sets the drive back to factory settings, but
> doesn't mark any bad sectors.

> Without adding/replacing the HD, I don't know of
> any alternatives.

> Too bad....

> Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
> Share what you know. Learn what you don't.

Ooooh, that sucks. You did the worst thing that could possibly be
done! I hope you at least used the BIOS low-level utility, and not
some third party utility. A low-level format will remove *everything*
on the disk, including the bad-sector tables that were made from the
factory. You probably removed the bad marks for some defects from the
factory, as well as the ones that you found and marked bad previously;
you probably have more bad sectors now!

Quote:> After going to Samsung's website, I found that there is
>_no_ low level formatting once it leaves the factory.

Generally not a good idea, to be sure. Well, if the problem isn't
progressive, in other words, if you aren't finding more bad areas
every time you check, then you can probably use a utility like
Norton's Disk Doctor (if you format the drive to FAT) to run several
thorough tests and mark all bad areas of the disk. If the problem is
progressive, you'll have to replace the disk.

[snip]

Quote:>Without adding/replacing the HD, I don't know of
>any alternatives.

That probably is your only alternative. Is the drive still under
warranty? Did you call Samsung and get an RMA for the drive? Samsung's
products are crappy IMHO, but they don't mess around with warranty
service; they're very fast. If you're on the east coast like me,
you'll get a fast turn-around, since Samsung does warranty service out
of New Jersey.

----
Bones

Quote:> Ooooh, that sucks. You did the worst thing that could possibly be
> done! I hope you at least used the BIOS low-level utility, and not
> some third party utility. A low-level format will remove *everything*
> on the disk, including the bad-sector tables that were made from the
> factory. You probably removed the bad marks for some defects from the
> factory, as well as the ones that you found and marked bad previously;
> you probably have more bad sectors now!

There is _no_ way to re-mark bad sectors. So, if I find one, there's no
way to avoid them using fsck. Is there another set of tools that could
be used to mark all the bad blocks in a sector instead of marking the
sector bad?

Quote:

> > After going to Samsung's website, I found that there is
> >_no_ low level formatting once it leaves the factory.

> Generally not a good idea, to be sure. Well, if the problem isn't
> progressive, in other words, if you aren't finding more bad areas
> every time you check, then you can probably use a utility like
> Norton's Disk Doctor (if you format the drive to FAT) to run several
> thorough tests and mark all bad areas of the disk. If the problem is
> progressive, you'll have to replace the disk.

I didn't realize that NDD worked on Linux partitions...

Quote:

> [snip]

> >Without adding/replacing the HD, I don't know of
> >any alternatives.

> That probably is your only alternative. Is the drive still under
> warranty? Did you call Samsung and get an RMA for the drive? Samsung's
> products are crappy IMHO, but they don't mess around with warranty
> service; they're very fast. If you're on the east coast like me,
> you'll get a fast turn-around, since Samsung does warranty service out
> of New Jersey.

I ended up returning the whole machine because I only had it a week and
it was still under warranty. I'm still on the lookout for a sub-$500
machine that will work sucessfully with Linux. If anyone has a lead, let
me know.

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Share what you know. Learn what you don't.

[snip]

Quote:>There is _no_ way to re-mark bad sectors. So, if I find one, there's no
>way to avoid them using fsck. Is there another set of tools that could
>be used to mark all the bad blocks in a sector instead of marking the
>sector bad?

/sbin/badblocks

Make sure you read the man page, though, and understand it.  You can nuke
your system with it. (Well, if you use the -w switch, which I've found
uncovers a lot more bad blocks and running w/o).

-- DN