[BlueOnyx:13734] Re: old raq550 question

[George F. Nemeyer]

On Tue, 24 Sep 2013, Michael Stauber wrote:

> Darn, has been a while since I had a real RaQ550 in front of me. For a
> moment I even forgot if they used IDE or SATA disks. :p

I've got one, too! ...and some RAQ-4s as well!  :)   I like them...they
don't eat much.

I echo the bad sector answer.  It's possible power surges damaged it.
Drives don't like power going down if in the middle of a write, and can
that can trash the sector indexing permanently.

Also, it's possible that filter caps in the power supply and on the
motherboard are drying out and losing effectiveness in keeping the power
'clean' which can cause all manner of 'flakey' behavior and random
reboots.  You can look inside at the caps and see if any are 'bulged' out
or appear to be split or oozing electrolyte.  If so, they need replacing.
You don't always see physical evidence, but the electrolyte can dry out
over time, reducing the effective capacitance of the part.

And the 550 uses IDE type drives.  In fact, only *some* brands and models
will physically fit, since the power and data 'plug' for the drive is a
hard-molded plastic part mounted on the main circuit board (not on a flex
cable), and some IDE drives have a data-to-power connector spacing that
won't allow the drive to plug in.  So if you do decide a drive is bad, be
sure to check you're getting a replacement that fits.

Don't give up on it, though!  They seem to be pretty robust.

=^_^=  Tigerwolf