Not so long ago I bought this baby: http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=772
I think this hard disk may be the root to all my problems. But a lot of strange stuff is happening (and I find it hard to believe that a brand new harddisk can cause so many problems), so I would like a second opinion from you guys before I send it back.
The problem(s):
First of all, when I’m in Windows, my computer all of sudden makes a major lag spike, which very seldom fixes itself without me pressing the power-button. The lag spikes appear no matter if I use a lot of CPU or not. Though I must admit, every time I’m afk for a while, the computer lags when I come back.
What always happens when I’ve shut down the computer is that I have to wait a long while before turning it on again. Because if I just let it run after rebooting, I can’t come into Windows because this error occurs:
“A disk read error occurred – Press CTRL + ALT + DELETE to restart”
Of course, I checked it out on Google, and found out that it (not only, but most likely) had something to do with my hard disk.
What I’ve tried to do to fix it:
I then checked all the things that had to do with the hard disk.
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First, I changed the SATA cables. That worked, until the computer lagged again.
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Then I checked BIOS and found out that first my hard disk wasn’t set as Primary IDE Master. I found out that a jumper didn’t come with the package, and then I was determined that this was the problem. But after checking the manual I found out that the hard disk didn’t require jumpers to get recognized as Primary and that it actually was due to the IDE Configuration that it wasn’t. So anyway, the hard disk was set as primary and I could now relax – I thought. It came with the same result as changing the SATA cables: It worked until it lagged again after start-up.
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The computer also lags after a while when I’ve changed the boot priority on hard disk/DVD respectively.
My questions:
- Would it have influence if I enable/disable “32BIT Data Transfer” on my hard disk in BIOS?
- Is it OK that my DVD is set as Third IDE Master?
- Should my “enhanced mode support” under “IDE configuration” in BIOS be S-ATA+P-ATA, S-ATA or P-ATA?
- Should I stop using my computer whilst I haven’t found a solution? (does it damage anything now I reboot all the time?)
What I suspect could be the malfunction:
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The hard disk
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Windows 7 – because it doesn’t seem to be that appropriate for my hard disk, since you can set an advanced format jumper setting to achieve full performance on Windows XP and not Windows 7.
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The motherboard – because of the SATA cables and various other reasons.
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RAM – because a person in a forum said that when he put his loose RAM correctly in their slots, the disc read error stopped. I have tried though, it didn’t work.
