Drive sometimes doesn't power up

couldabin · October 21, 2012, 1:33am

I have a Dell Dimension 4300 running XP, and added a 500 GB Green Caviar as a second drive. Because the computer came with PATA, I had to buy a PCI controller card (Silicon Graphics) for the WD drive. When I boot, the controller banner always posts, and if everything is working right, a second or two later it displays the drive number, model and size. Sometimes it displays nothing, in which case when the OS is fully booted the drive doesn’t appear. I was getting a clicking noise at boot, returned the drive for replacement, was sent a 1 TB drive by WD; same problem. The Dimension comes with a 250W power supply, which isn’t enough for two drives; mine has a recently installed 480W that has both Molex and SATA cables. Is this is known issue with the drive? How likely is it the problem is the controller?

Hammey · October 21, 2012, 3:35pm

Hi what sata add on card is it, does it support sata 3 . Also the drive is a advanced format drive so you may have to align the drive. There is no known problem with the green drives failing like that I would look at that controller card and contact them to see it the drive is supported.

couldabin · October 22, 2012, 3:58pm

Thanks for the tip. The controller is 150 MB/s (Silcon Image 3512 SATARaid). I found the WD knowledgebase article about this and haven’t had a chance to look at the label on my drive – should it support jumpering pins 5-6 to lock in the 150 MB/s rate?

Hammey · October 22, 2012, 6:26pm

Hi well if the green drive is sata 6gbs you cant make it run on sata 1.5. . If it is sata a sata 3 gbs drive it should jumper to sata 1.5 gbs or the sata controller may do it auto. You just cant use a sata 3 drive on sata 1

couldabin · October 22, 2012, 11:38pm

I’m on the computer now. Here’s what Device Manager shows for the controller. If I understand the dialog box correctly, the drive is communicating at 1.5 Gb/s. To me, that suggests it’s a negotiation issue at bootup, which I’m hoping the jumper will solve. Do you agree?

MRFSYS · October 23, 2012, 6:20pm

jumpering pins 5-6 to lock in the 150 MB/s

Yes, according to this WD article on “jumper settings”,

jumper pins 5-6 for 150 MB/second:

http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/other/2579-001037.pdf

But, I don’t generally buy those WD drives,

so I don’t know for sure if this jumper pair

works the same on your drive.

MRFS

couldabin · October 23, 2012, 7:14pm

Thanks for the link. I have two questions:

I don’t know when SATA III first became available, but I see that document is 2005. I’m wondering if the fastest mode at that time was SATA II. I ask this because the docs I’ve found on WD’s site say a jumper on 5-6 throttles a SATA III drive from 6 Gb/s to 3 Gb/s, and that jumper on a SATA II drive throttles it from 3 Gb/s to 1.5 Gb/s. Do you know if that’s the case? If so, would putting the jumper on help? Or would it force a SATA III to operate at 3 Gb/s, preventing it from being used with a 1.5 Gb/s controller?
I’ve read in numerous posts on this site (and even in this thread) that a SATA III drive cannot be used with a SATA I (1.5 Gb/s) controller. I believe my drive is SATA III, and if I understand Device Manager correctly, it is operating at 1.5 Gb/s. Evidently it can negotiate down to that speed. And since I’m using the drive (although its startup behavior is erratic) with a 1.5 Gb/s controller, it cannot be that the two are always incompatible. Do you know of any KnowledgeBase articles that discuss this?

Thanks.