I think I killed my iRiver H140 drive, from a fall--confirmation/suggestions?

[Mikerman]

Your advice:  is my hard drive dead/is there anything I can/should do?

The story:

Yesterday, the horrible of horribles happened:  my iRiver H-140, while on and playing, slipped out of my jacket pocket, at about 5 feet off the ground, and fell flat onto the tile/marble floor.  It was in the player's original leather case, and landed flat on its back, with no external damage whatsoever.

The player continued to play but then stalled (I don't recall what the display showed, but the player clearly no longer was playing).  I turned the player off and then started it again.  It started, but when going into Rockbox, I got a message along the lines of, "ATA error -11.  Connect USB and press a button."  When I booted into the original iRiver firmware, I got a "Check HDD connection" message.  However, I then was able to get to the iRiver files screen, but no files were shown (I have many) and I got a listing showing some non-English characters.

I tried connecting to my computer with the above Rockbox message displayed, but the hard drive wouldn't register (although I got the Rockbox bootloader screen, I believe (I may have this wrong)).  I then fully charged the player and got the green charging light, but I still couldn't see any files when starting the player and was unable to play anything--I got the same messages as before.  I was able to get into the iRiver system selections screens (e.g. General, etc.)--but when, in an attempt at something, I tried to format the disk under the iRiver firmware, I got an iRiver failure message.

Thinking that the hard drive connection might have come loose, I opened the case last evening and re-seated the hard drive (everything inside the player looks fine, thankfully)--same results as above.  I had replaced my original hard drive a year ago with a 60 gb drive.  I now replaced the 60 gb drive with the original 40 gb drive (which, thankfully, I had not sold and still had), and the player worked.  Replacing, then, the original drive with the newer 60 gb drive (the one involved in the fall), and the player wouldn't work.  Trying this multiple times led to this same result:  old drive, fine, new drive, nothing.  I then loaded the old drive, in the player, with files, including the Rockbox files, and the player functions fine, booting into Rockbox when turned on.

And so:  am I correct that the 60 gb hard drive, at this point, is dead?  Is there anything I should try on it, before holding a wake?  Given that the player doesn't seem to even register the 60 gb drive, I'm not sure that I could even do anything to it (apart from a burial).

I assume that the fall killed the drive.  Sigh.  A traumatic experience, to say the least--resulting in no appetite for lunch or dinner.  But the positive side:  I had just backed up the drive a few days before, and so only lost a single ripped CD and 5 podcasts, easily re-ripped/downloaded.  And while I see about a 60 gb drive replacement, I at least have the 40 gb drive to use.  (I know that some may feel that 40 gb should be enough, but I currently have 43-44 gb of files, and want them all.)

Thanks for any suggestions.  And if there's any spare 60 gb drive around or a good source, please let me know.

Sigh.

;(

[LambdaCalculus]

Dude, that's terrible to hear. I feel your pain...

A similar situation occured to a friend of mine who had his Archos Jukebox Recorder flashed with Rockbox recently. He accidently hit a crack in the sidewalk on his way home and dropped it from his hand. Thankfully, he had the padded pouch on it, but the shock was enough to stall his hard drive in the same way. When he e-mailed me about it, he had mentioned that the Recorder wasn't recognizing the hard drive, instead giving the same "ATA error -11" message. I told him to remove the drive and connect it to his PC to see if it was OK. Sure enough, when he connected it to his hard drive, all he heard was a feeble "CLICK-CLICK GRONK-GRONK" coming from the drive. He had lost nearly all of his ripped CDs and some recordings he had made for school.

In the end, he bought a nice 80GB hard drive and installed it in his Archos. Out of curiousity, he and I looked at the hard drive's innards, and we saw a nice fat gouge carved into the top platter. I think the head bounced hard and scraped up the platter due to the shock. His Archos is still working, thankfully, and he's glad to now have 80GB instead of just 10GB. Most of his files had been recovered from a DVD backup he made (and happened to have nearly lost in this crisis!  ), and he's back in business.

I think that you may have gotten a scratch on your hard drive's platters as well. It's good that the iriver survived, however... I'll never get over how durable the H1x0 models are!

[Mikerman]

Thanks, and I'm afraid that this is my sad state.

Actually, I'm surprised that I have not just stripped off all my clothes and sat in a public garden somewhere, out of sheer depression.  It was extremely painful listening to the car radio on the way home from work last nite, instead of to a podcast--my player goes with me everywhere and is my driving companion.

I think what kept me sane was, that I had backed up a few days before.  A vey big lesson to one and all.

And in checking now, I see that the price of replacement 60 gb drives has come down (the 80 gb drives are out-of-touch).  Some good deals on eBay for refurbished drives, but I don't know that I would trust those.  And for $25 more, I found a new one, from what I think is a major electronics retailer selling on eBay under a different name.

Sigh, said again ...

[XavierGr]

If you don't hear weird noises coming out of your player, you could try to open the device and try to resit the Hard Disk in its slot.

[AlexP]

Yeah, I dropped my H140 and killed the 40gb drive.  Fortunately, I then got a 60!  It is an arse, but you pay for the size of a hd with the increased fragility.

[Mikerman]

If you don't hear weird noises coming out of your player, you could try to open the device and try to resit the Hard Disk in its slot.

Thanks and yep, I tried that (3-4 times).  Result was a no-go with the drive that had fallen, while the old drive was fine.