Drive Stiction Hack

[cpi...@mica.net]

A 1GB hard disk died in our department Indigo yesterday. It was
an IBM drive, and the make/model are very succeptable to stiction.
And indeed, it did die of stiction when a co-worker of mine moved
it from the lab to an empty cubicle...it was powered off just long
enough for everything to bind up.

But we hadn't backed it up in a long while. The system wouldn't boo
properly without it--we were as stuck as the drive. Banging the dis
gave us nothing....I knew the disk had worked for 18 months just
fine, no reason it should quit now except the drive was cold....

ObHack:
I warmed the drive up and it worked just fine. How? Didn't want to
put it in the microwave :-) and our building's toaster oven was on
the fritz. I left the hard disk on the dashboard of my car with
the windows all rolled up (about 65 degrees and sunny that day).
After a couple of hours the drive was so hot it was uncomfortable to
hold in my hands...rushed it back in the building, plugged it in and
it spun right up.

And then we backed up. :-)