Help with a Dimension 8200 Memory and Freezing
in [Dell]
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From: RnR on 8 Feb 2010 10:57 On Mon, 08 Feb 2010 09:23:50 -0500, Ben Myers <ben_myers(a)charter.net> wrote: >On 2/8/2010 7:28 AM, RnR wrote: >> On Sat, 6 Feb 2010 15:10:19 -0500, "Sam"<sasdfas09(a)lkuy.com> wrote: >> >>> Hi, I pulled out an old Dell Dimension 8200 w/ 512mb ram and Win Xp Pro and >>> updated w/ sp3, Windows Essentials and all the other updates. >>> What kind of memory does it use? I want to upgrade to 2gb if I ncan. >>> I'm thinking I can probably pick up memory on eBay for it. >>> >>> The PC freezes up infrequently and I want to try a memory upgrade first. >>> >>> Thanks >>> >>> Sam >>> >> >> Just in case you decide you don't want to risk the data and to add to >> William's post, you might want to make a backup to another physical >> drive before any hard drive diags/testing. And I agree with William >> that Spinrite as well as some HD mfgrs diags are likely the best >> choices to run tests on your hard drive before any others. Often you >> can download the mfgr HD diags for free from their website. Spinrite >> in the past was not free (not sure now). > >As a quick overall test of hard drive sanity, HDAT2 is very good because >it allows one to view the SMART data, especially the info maintained by >the drive about relocated sectors, pending relocated sectors, maximum >temperature of the drive ever, etc. > >The only fly in the ointment is that some drive manufacturers do not >comply with the alleged industry standard for SMART, so there will >sometimes be wildly improbable SMART values, as with Fujitsu drives. > >As far as I know, EVERY hard drive manufacturer still in business today >EXCEPT TOSHIBA has a free download of diagnostics for its brand of >drives. And Toshiba? Who knows? They ain't talking. This is one very >good reason not to specify or buy Toshiba drives, which coincidentally >seem to have worse reliability than other 2.5" drives. > >... Ben Myers Has SMART improved because from my past experience, SMART info was wrong? I once had a drive that SMART reported healthy and it was not. I think the mfgr diag then conflicted with SMART. This was around 5 plus years ago and now I don't recall the brand name of that drive. I think that was the only time I had this happen.
From: Ben Myers on 8 Feb 2010 12:11 On 2/8/2010 10:57 AM, RnR wrote: > On Mon, 08 Feb 2010 09:23:50 -0500, Ben Myers<ben_myers(a)charter.net> > wrote: > >> On 2/8/2010 7:28 AM, RnR wrote: >>> On Sat, 6 Feb 2010 15:10:19 -0500, "Sam"<sasdfas09(a)lkuy.com> wrote: >>> >>>> Hi, I pulled out an old Dell Dimension 8200 w/ 512mb ram and Win Xp Pro and >>>> updated w/ sp3, Windows Essentials and all the other updates. >>>> What kind of memory does it use? I want to upgrade to 2gb if I ncan. >>>> I'm thinking I can probably pick up memory on eBay for it. >>>> >>>> The PC freezes up infrequently and I want to try a memory upgrade first. >>>> >>>> Thanks >>>> >>>> Sam >>>> >>> >>> Just in case you decide you don't want to risk the data and to add to >>> William's post, you might want to make a backup to another physical >>> drive before any hard drive diags/testing. And I agree with William >>> that Spinrite as well as some HD mfgrs diags are likely the best >>> choices to run tests on your hard drive before any others. Often you >>> can download the mfgr HD diags for free from their website. Spinrite >>> in the past was not free (not sure now). >> >> As a quick overall test of hard drive sanity, HDAT2 is very good because >> it allows one to view the SMART data, especially the info maintained by >> the drive about relocated sectors, pending relocated sectors, maximum >> temperature of the drive ever, etc. >> >> The only fly in the ointment is that some drive manufacturers do not >> comply with the alleged industry standard for SMART, so there will >> sometimes be wildly improbable SMART values, as with Fujitsu drives. >> >> As far as I know, EVERY hard drive manufacturer still in business today >> EXCEPT TOSHIBA has a free download of diagnostics for its brand of >> drives. And Toshiba? Who knows? They ain't talking. This is one very >> good reason not to specify or buy Toshiba drives, which coincidentally >> seem to have worse reliability than other 2.5" drives. >> >> ... Ben Myers > > > Has SMART improved because from my past experience, SMART info was > wrong? I once had a drive that SMART reported healthy and it was not. > I think the mfgr diag then conflicted with SMART. This was around 5 > plus years ago and now I don't recall the brand name of that drive. I > think that was the only time I had this happen. The SMART spec has always been alive, well and healthy. But for whatever reason, many companies do not follow the spec, so blivets show up regularly in the SMART data when it is viewed with HDAT2 or comparable software. WD is pretty solid in its implementation of SMART, though. For me, the SMART data provides an indication of drive health, but it is not necessarily the final word, unless the drive has lots of reallocated sectors, lots of sectors pending reallocation or other negative SMART indicators. Diagnostics provide other data based on overall testing. For example, SMART may declare a drive with 100 reallocated sectors to be perfectly healthy, but the same drive goes into my electronic scrap pile. My reasoning is that if a drive has reallocated sectors, some mishap or some defect caused them to be reallocated. Drives are way too cheap (and cheaply made) to trust a drive that already has defects. The value of my data or my clients' data is way too great to live with a drive known to have reallocated sectors... Ben Myers
From: RnR on 8 Feb 2010 13:33 On Mon, 08 Feb 2010 12:11:42 -0500, Ben Myers <ben_myers(a)charter.net> wrote: >On 2/8/2010 10:57 AM, RnR wrote: >> On Mon, 08 Feb 2010 09:23:50 -0500, Ben Myers<ben_myers(a)charter.net> >> wrote: >> >>> On 2/8/2010 7:28 AM, RnR wrote: >>>> On Sat, 6 Feb 2010 15:10:19 -0500, "Sam"<sasdfas09(a)lkuy.com> wrote: >>>> >>>>> Hi, I pulled out an old Dell Dimension 8200 w/ 512mb ram and Win Xp Pro and >>>>> updated w/ sp3, Windows Essentials and all the other updates. >>>>> What kind of memory does it use? I want to upgrade to 2gb if I ncan. >>>>> I'm thinking I can probably pick up memory on eBay for it. >>>>> >>>>> The PC freezes up infrequently and I want to try a memory upgrade first. >>>>> >>>>> Thanks >>>>> >>>>> Sam >>>>> >>>> >>>> Just in case you decide you don't want to risk the data and to add to >>>> William's post, you might want to make a backup to another physical >>>> drive before any hard drive diags/testing. And I agree with William >>>> that Spinrite as well as some HD mfgrs diags are likely the best >>>> choices to run tests on your hard drive before any others. Often you >>>> can download the mfgr HD diags for free from their website. Spinrite >>>> in the past was not free (not sure now). >>> >>> As a quick overall test of hard drive sanity, HDAT2 is very good because >>> it allows one to view the SMART data, especially the info maintained by >>> the drive about relocated sectors, pending relocated sectors, maximum >>> temperature of the drive ever, etc. >>> >>> The only fly in the ointment is that some drive manufacturers do not >>> comply with the alleged industry standard for SMART, so there will >>> sometimes be wildly improbable SMART values, as with Fujitsu drives. >>> >>> As far as I know, EVERY hard drive manufacturer still in business today >>> EXCEPT TOSHIBA has a free download of diagnostics for its brand of >>> drives. And Toshiba? Who knows? They ain't talking. This is one very >>> good reason not to specify or buy Toshiba drives, which coincidentally >>> seem to have worse reliability than other 2.5" drives. >>> >>> ... Ben Myers >> >> >> Has SMART improved because from my past experience, SMART info was >> wrong? I once had a drive that SMART reported healthy and it was not. >> I think the mfgr diag then conflicted with SMART. This was around 5 >> plus years ago and now I don't recall the brand name of that drive. I >> think that was the only time I had this happen. > >The SMART spec has always been alive, well and healthy. But for >whatever reason, many companies do not follow the spec, so blivets show >up regularly in the SMART data when it is viewed with HDAT2 or >comparable software. WD is pretty solid in its implementation of SMART, >though. > >For me, the SMART data provides an indication of drive health, but it is >not necessarily the final word, unless the drive has lots of reallocated >sectors, lots of sectors pending reallocation or other negative SMART >indicators. Diagnostics provide other data based on overall testing. > >For example, SMART may declare a drive with 100 reallocated sectors to >be perfectly healthy, but the same drive goes into my electronic scrap >pile. My reasoning is that if a drive has reallocated sectors, some >mishap or some defect caused them to be reallocated. Drives are way too >cheap (and cheaply made) to trust a drive that already has defects. The >value of my data or my clients' data is way too great to live with a >drive known to have reallocated sectors... Ben Myers I couldn't agree more on the last few sentences. I get suspicious the moment I see either bad or relocated sectors popping up or unusual noises for my own drives regardless what the tests show. At one time, I think the tests were more valuable considering the price of drive space but today, unless the budget is tight, a new drive is probably a safer bet if data is important on a day to day operation. Now perhaps it's a little different for a residential client because you don't have a feel for their drive on a day to day basis so tests might be in order and their budget might be tight especially if they have to pay for outside help. Matter of fact, I just got an industry newsletter (meant for self employed technicians) today that talked about when technicians might consider when to fix vs. replace parts for clients. They said it can be a different answer for a residential client vs a business client. The reason being is that residential clients' likely first goal is to save money even if it means their pc is down a little longer but for a business client, their usual goal is to get up and running faster, even if it costs more.
From: William R. Walsh on 8 Feb 2010 19:14 Hi! > As a quick overall test of hard drive sanity, HDAT2 is very good because > it allows one to view the SMART data, especially the info maintained by > the drive about relocated sectors, pending relocated sectors, maximum > temperature of the drive ever, etc. SpinRite has some degree of SMART support in version 6, but it doesn't show you the "worst ever" values (at least not for the most part) and I'm not sure it always interprets the values by the right name. > The only fly in the ointment is that some drive manufacturers do not > comply with the alleged industry standard for SMART, so there will > sometimes be wildly improbable SMART values, as with Fujitsu drives. I didn't know there was an industry standard, other than "everyone do as you please". I'm only half joking. > As far as I know, EVERY hard drive manufacturer still in business today > EXCEPT TOSHIBA has a free download of diagnostics for its brand of > drives. And Toshiba? Who knows? As I said the last time you brought that up...you don't need a utility for a Toshiba hard drive. If you have to ask, it's bad. :-) Maybe that will improve. They bought Fujitsu's mobile hard disk business, and so far as I can say, the Fujitsu mobile drives are very good. (Desktop drives are another story entirely.) William
From: William R. Walsh on 8 Feb 2010 19:34
Hi! > Has SMART improved because from my past experience, SMART info was > wrong? Yes and no. Every drive maker has a different idea about how SMART should be implemented, how errors should be detected and what categories they should watch. And the thresholds all differ as well--which is to say that each manufacturer has a different idea of "how bad" things have to get before the drive is considered to be failing. Out of all of the drives I've seen, I'd say that Maxtor has the most informative SMART reporting. Yes, believe it or not. Their drives monitor a wide variety of parameters and the values do shift around while the drive operates. Second in line would be Seagate, whose drives don't show as many parameters but still seem to be pretty honest. Quantum drives fit somewhere in between, and Quantum was actually one of the first companies to implement SMART in a hard drive. Hitachi GST/IBM drives have a similar selection of monitored parameters, but I'll have to admit that I've never seen them vary a whole lot, even on very obviously sick drives. ExcelStor drives behave very similarly, which isn't too surprising considering that A) their drives are mostly Deskstar clones, B) HGST made some of their control boards and C) someone told me that HGST owns ExcelStor now. Western Digital (who makes otherwise excellent hard drives in my experience) has typically been very conservative with SMART data...with only a few monitored parameters and seemingly little variation, even on drives that were starting to have problems. Of course, SMART data is sometimes only collected by a drive when it is idle. In a modern operating system, between power management events (spin down) and disk activity in general, a drive may never get a chance to do its SMART self test routines because it either isn't idle for long enough, or it's spun down. (Other drives seem to observe what's going on while they are active, such as drives from Seagate, HGST and Maxtor.) So sometimes a drive needs a little prodding to update its SMART data and notice a problem. That kind of defeats the purpose. Tools such as SpinRite, HDAT2 and SpeedFan can all initiate that prodding. A funny thing that I've seen happen across multiple brands of drive is where the SMART historical data indicates that a drive was in very serious trouble, as a monitored parameter would drop down to the lowest possible (worst) value. Later on, for whatever reason, the drive recovered to perfect health. Most recently, a 40GB WD hard disk in a Dimension 2400 showed this behavior, with its "raw read error rate" dropping to 0. But at some point, it recovered to perfect health. Why and how this could happen baffles me, but I've seen several drives do it and go on to work fine for quite some time. They're not drives I would trust, so they don't go into roles where a drive failure would cause a real problem. SMART would probably work a lot better if there were more consistency in how it was implemented, if drive makers were more honest and didn't mind their drive looking bad if it meant an advance warning of disaster, and if all drives gave their self test routines a higher priority. All of the above makes the assumption that SMART is enabled AND that someone is listening. Most drives can disable their SMART diagnostics upon receiving a command to do so. Some ASUS motherboard BIOSes (and others) do this! Of course, even if the drive's SMART system is enabled, someone has to be listening when it calls for help. Very few systems do that...most Dell desktops do, as do the good old Compaq Deskpro EN systems. I've even seen a few eMachines whose BIOS was watching for SMART problems, amazingly enough. It's usually the BIOS that sounds the alarm, so a user only gets a warning at power on time. Later SMART alerting would have to come from software that knows how to find and interpret SMART data, as the BIOS can't do much after the OS has taken control. I've seen SMART warnings save the day. If only that sort of thing happened more often... William |