> > Now, my question is, can (or is it remotely possible) linux be
> > writing something out to the WD IDE drives to break the drive. The
> > analogy being, that you can write to a video controller and cause
> > damage to a monitor. One of our people have suggested that Linux is
> > writing to sector 0 of the WD IDE drive.
>
> No IDE doesnt permit a host system to damage the disk. The bang bang sounds
> like the unit is dead.
>
> > These WDs drives were bought at separate times so we do not suspect
> > that we got hold of a bad batch of drives.
>
Would it happen to be a Caviar 21000 series? We had a lab full of them
(P5/120 Linux workstations). Turns out they had a firmware defect that
*really* showed up under heavy access (read: non-windoze). WD shipped us
a firmware upgrade, but, as we found out, ten minutes worth of access on
the drive already did the damage, of the 29 machines, all but 5 have been
replaced.
WD fixed the problem before introduction of the 31000.
Cheers,
-Jonathan _ _
------------------------------------------------------------->>>>>>>>-(o)(o)---
Jonathan A. Davis | Academic Systems Analyst | Hattiesburg/Gulf Park/Stennis
Computing Center | Box 5171 | 39401-5171 | (601) 266-4103 | davis@cc.usm.edu
http://evergreen.cc.usm.edu/~davis | Linux: The choice of a GNU generation