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Hector812 · Oct 5, 2004, 08:08 AM

Recently decided to erase and write zeroes to disk after experiencing intermittent freezes. I began at 2 p.m. yesterday and the progress bar is still only a 1/3 of the way through and has been that way for about the last 6 hours. Will I damage the disk physically if I stop and start over? Thanks

Quicksilver 2002 Dual 1ghz 1gb 80gbHD RAM 10.3.4

GoGoReggieXPowars · Oct 5, 2004, 11:13 AM

No you won't damage the disk, but there's no real point to zeroing it in the first place.

buffalolee · Oct 5, 2004, 12:46 PM

Sounds like a bad sector on your hard drive.

Detrius · Oct 5, 2004, 05:07 PM

The secondary purpose of zeroing all data is to map out bad blocks on the drive. Therefore, there is a practical purpose. If this process is getting stuck at 1/3, you may have more serious issues with your drive than just bad blocks.

I have seen numerous hard drives that only work when they are cool. Once they heat up, they stop working. This may be what is going on with your drive. Turn the machine off; let it sit for a few hours; boot it up and run a surface scan (TTP4 if your machine won't boot OS 9, Drive Setup if it will).

Hector812 · Oct 5, 2004, 08:10 PM

Thanks for the help everyone. I'll try the surface scan and cross my fingers. I happened to run across a thread at Apple where someone with the same setup as I have including the Radeon 9800, 17" Studio Display and Apples DVI to ADC adapter was having the same intermittent problems. He called ATI to see if it might be the vid card and they said to send it in. I hope that's all it is.

Quicksilver 2002 Dual 1ghz 1gb 80gbHD RAM 10.3.4

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Detrius · Oct 7, 2004, 06:46 PM

Originally posted by Hector812:
Thanks for the help everyone. I'll try the surface scan and cross my fingers. I happened to run across a thread at Apple where someone with the same setup as I have including the Radeon 9800, 17" Studio Display and Apples DVI to ADC adapter was having the same intermittent problems. He called ATI to see if it might be the vid card and they said to send it in. I hope that's all it is.

Quicksilver 2002 Dual 1ghz 1gb 80gbHD RAM 10.3.4

A video card isn't going to cause a format to fail halfway through the process. ATI told him to send the card in because the person on the phone was reading from a script and didn't know that formatting a hard drive has absolutely nothing at all to do with a video card... because it's not a problem that is in their script.

Turnpike · Oct 7, 2004, 11:00 PM

writing zeroes does take a while, but not THAT long. 8-way random, on the other hand...

good luck with your machine

naphtali · Oct 8, 2004, 10:52 AM

Originally posted by Turnpike:
writing zeroes does take a while, but not THAT long. 8-way random, on the other hand...

good luck with your machine

Hmm a little off-topic but has anyone had luck with 8-way random writing? I tried it with my 17" and my old Pismo but it's always gotten stuck with the progress bar just a little blue.. With the legal betas I tested previously, 8-way was fine and dandy though.

djohnson · Oct 8, 2004, 01:40 PM

Originally posted by naphtali:
Hmm a little off-topic but has anyone had luck with 8-way random writing? I tried it with my 17" and my old Pismo but it's always gotten stuck with the progress bar just a little blue.. With the legal betas I tested previously, 8-way was fine and dandy though.

I tried on my laptop twice, but it froze each time.

Hector812 · Oct 8, 2004, 07:39 PM

Well looks like I'll be taking my old friend into the nearest Apple Store for some service. I think I've tried every home remedy I can think. Disk Util, Disk Warrior(minor errors all fixed), zeroed out the drive. I even booted up off a 9.2 disc and used Drive Setup to search for bad blocks and it didn't find any. Took out all 3rd party cards and ram. Damn I hate being without my computer even though we have 2 others at home. Pretty sad huh?

BTW thanks to everyone for the input.