eSATA New Drive

My Seagate eSATA drive failed so I replaced it with a Hitachi. It shows up
OK and I can read and write to it. However, Acronis hangs when try to
initialize it and Windows hangs when I try to change the drive letter. Both
of these work in Safe Mode, just not in normal operation. Any ideas what
might cause the hangup?

GTnH wrote:
> My Seagate eSATA drive failed so I replaced it with a Hitachi. It shows up
> OK and I can read and write to it. However, Acronis hangs when try to
> initialize it and Windows hangs when I try to change the drive letter. Both
> of these work in Safe Mode, just not in normal operation. Any ideas what
> might cause the hangup?

1) Connect the bare drive mechanism to an internal SATA port and
run the drive manufacturer's diagnostic against it. Does it pass ?

2) Use the "Force 150MB/sec" jumper on the back of the bare drive
mechanism, to force the cable rate to the slower of the two options.

3) Use a 1 meter cable for ESATA instead of 2 meters.

Some computer ESATA interfaces are connected to SATA chips, and do not
necessarily have the improved characteristics of a proper ESATA chip.
Workaround (2) and (3) can help with that. An ESATA interface is like
a normal SATA interface, only is slightly more sensitive, and that is
why a longer cable can be used.

Paul

"Paul" wrote:

> GTnH wrote:
> > My Seagate eSATA drive failed so I replaced it with a Hitachi. It shows up
> > OK and I can read and write to it. However, Acronis hangs when try to
> > initialize it and Windows hangs when I try to change the drive letter. Both
> > of these work in Safe Mode, just not in normal operation. Any ideas what
> > might cause the hangup?
>
> 1) Connect the bare drive mechanism to an internal SATA port and
> run the drive manufacturer's diagnostic against it. Does it pass ?
>
> 2) Use the "Force 150MB/sec" jumper on the back of the bare drive
> mechanism, to force the cable rate to the slower of the two options.
>
> 3) Use a 1 meter cable for ESATA instead of 2 meters.
>
> Some computer ESATA interfaces are connected to SATA chips, and do not
> necessarily have the improved characteristics of a proper ESATA chip.
> Workaround (2) and (3) can help with that. An ESATA interface is like
> a normal SATA interface, only is slightly more sensitive, and that is
> why a longer cable can be used.
>
> Paul
>

The problem is now solved after comparing services running normally and in
safe mode. After innumerable reboots I found that the Distributed Link
Tracking Client service is the problem. Disabling that solved the problem.
Apparently in keeping track of the NTFS files it didn't like the fact that
the drive was changed and locked onto it.
Thanks for your response.
George