FC4 and external hard drive (USB)

[John Bray]

On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 09:47 -0400, Claude Jones wrote:
> On Mon August 8 2005 4:00 am, Hans Müller wrote:
> 
> > I use a Maxtor One Touch II wih USB and Firewire
> 
> I have a suggestion for you. Don't keep anything on that drive you can't 
> afford to lose. We have a graveyard in the bone room downstairs of dead 
> Maxtor One Touch drives - If you are stuck with it. make sure you don't stack 
> it. If it has the feet for standing it on its side, that 'may' keep it a bit 
> cooler, though my evidence for that is only anecdotal - it would appear that 
> in the vertical position, the drive case has more surface area exposed to 
> open air. Positioning it horizontally creates a heat trap on the bottom side. 

i think this is NOT limited to the drives used in maxtor one touch
boxes.

maxtor appears to be having a very bad problem with heat killing the
controller board which is on the bottoms side of their drives.  it
appears to be quite common just now.

if you are using any maxtor drives, i'd suggest getting a fan on their
bottom sides asap.

if you have a seemingly dead maxtor drive, often you can recover the
data by putting the controller card from a good maxtor drive on it long
enough to recover the data.  YMMV.

i know of over 10 people who have had maxtors crap out like this.  the
key thing seems to be that those drives with fans on them don't crap
out, while many with no great air movement on them die.

john