SCSI HD of DOOM!

P

pauli

New Member
Hi, okay, I have a problem and I can’t seem to fix it… I have an Adaptec SCSI 19160 Ultra 160 SCSI card and a Seagate ST373207LW 10K SCSI HDD and my problem is I get a “Delayed Write Failed” in Windows XP Pro every time I try to write to this drive. I’ve done a LL format, re-partitioned, etc…

According to Microsoft, the “Enable write caching on the disk” feature is the problem, but I get this problem even when it’s turned off, so that can’t be it.

The next possible cause is: “the UDMA HDD controller is configured either:
1 – You are using a 40-wire connector cable, not an 80 wire (It’s a 68pin SCSI drive, so I think I can rule this one out)
2 – The BIOS settings configured to force faster UDMA modes

I don’t quite get the second cause… In the BIOS for the SCSI card there are only two options: “low level format” and “verify a disk”…

Any suggestions at all? Please help!


Thanks
 
Do you have another SCSI card? There could be a problem with the card you're currently using. I had this Delayed Write problem with my WD external drive - it was plugged into a bad USB port.
 
Hi,

Thanks for the suggestion... I don't have another SCSI card but the card works fine with my burner, so I pretty sure the card is good.
 
Check that your SCSI chain is terminated properly. If it is OK try updating your SCSI driver.

I don't know the validity of this but I found:
The LargeSystemCache Registry tweak and ATI video adapters. One peculiar set of circumstances that has been observed on multiple machines with ATI video adapters and more than 512MB of memory involves the LargeSystemCache Registry setting, a DWORD entry found in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlSession ManagerMemory Management. This setting governs the amount of memory set aside by the system for certain kernel processes. If it's set to 1 (which allegedly improves performance on systems with more than 512MB of memory), it can cause data corruption on some systems, and produce the "Delayed Write Failed" error. Try resetting it to 0 if it's been set.
Click to expand...
 
Hi,

Another good suggestion... It took me while to get on this because I had actually pull my computer out for under the desk to see (you made me second guess myself) but it’s good. Well, here’s more story:

When I built the system, the SCSI system was set up as so:

Terminator – Controller – HDD

Or, for you more visual types:
scsi.jpg


And it worked… Until the HDD died and Seagate replaced it under warranty…

Ever since then, nada, zip, squat… The new HDD has never worked since and has been exchanged yet again with the same problem – yikes.

Any other ideas... PLEASE!
 
Do you have termination after the drive as well? I don't think that model is self terminating.
 
Ahem... Well, umm... Don't I feel silly... Yes, umm, according to Seagate, no, this drive is NOT self terminating... My CARD is self terminating, so, essentially, my SCSI cable was backwards... Wow… Okay, please stop laughing… :’(

I turned the cable around and presto, it works like a charm.

You know this has been a problem for months now. Boy oh boy…

Thank you so much.
 
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