Dropping an HDD from a certain height was mentioned in an old Sun service manual, IIRC.
Re:The IT Crowd US Pilot (2007) [video]
by cestith on Thursday September 22, 2022 @10:01AM
(#32938852)
At one point maintenance for desktop workstations from some manufacturers included picking the whole unit up 3 to 5 inches or so and letting it drop onto the desk. This would in theory help reseat card-edge connectors and knock loose some of the dust gathered by static inside the unit.
Re:The IT Crowd US Pilot (2007) [video]
by GeekyBear on Thursday September 22, 2022 @12:37PM
(#32941324)
>picking the whole unit up 3 to 5 inches or so and letting it drop onto the desk
This was an infamous fix when your Atari ST's chips were working their way out of their sockets back in the 1980's.
http://info-coach.fr/atari/documents/_myfaq/quickfaq-2.8a/st...
Re:The IT Crowd US Pilot (2007) [video]
by cyckl on Thursday September 22, 2022 @10:57AM
(#32939728)
if you dont mind me asking—where can i find this manual?
Re:The IT Crowd US Pilot (2007) [video]
by randombits0 on Thursday September 22, 2022 @05:33PM
(#32944896)
Stuck stepper. Bet it was a Seagate ST225 or similar. The bearing grease would harden, especially if left not running for a while.
The solution is to use your pinky finger on the stepper motor spindle and twist. As long as you felt the stepper move from home, you’re good, you’re not stuck anymore.
I had a Seagate I had to “twist” start every time it powered up, not often as it ran 24/7. You can do it with the drive in the machine as long as you can reach the stepper.
I’m writing this not so much for you but for the archivists thousands of years from now. Hope you get those Seagates started folks! ;)
After trying it in a couple of different computers I accidentally dropped the drive and it hit a metal table leg.
After dropping it, the HDD started up and worked fine, and I could copy the contents off.
Maybe the liquid nitrogen worked the same way (thermal shock in place of mechanical shock).