Corrupt images on one drive only

I have a new Vista computer with two internal drives -

C: is the main (SATA) drive, the one I want to image and periodically backup.
F: is an IDE drive which I will only use for the backups of C:

Using ATI 11 (lastest build), every image I create on F: fails verification. I have run the Memtest suggested elsewhere with no problems. I contacted customer service to see about getting a refund, and they sent me a link to update the SNAPI driver, which didn't help either. I have run two different disk checks on F: and found no problems. One thing worth noting is that this drive was just removed from another computer where it was the backup drive using a copy of ATI 8 and worked fine.

As a test, I created an image of C: on C: itself. It verified fine. I also tried using an external USB drive, and that image verified OK.

All of the chipset and other drivers are up to date.

Any ideas as to what could be causing problems with this one drive? Is there some OS setting (write cache, etc) which might fix the issue?

 

Have you run check disk on the F drive [chkdsk f: /r] to identify bad sectors?

Edit:
Have you tried replacing the IDE cable?

 

Yes, no bad sectors found on F:

 

Replaced the IDE cable tonight. Same result - corrupted image.

 

Two additional pieces of data -

Swapped the IDE and USB drives and the problem follows the drive, so it isn't a problem with the IDE port or chipset.

If I create a validated image on C: and then copy it over to F:, it will fail validation.

Overall, it would seem to be an issue with this drive, but it is a fairly new Maxtor 300GB and it works great with ATI 8.0.

I have to wonder if there is some inherent incompatibility between ATI 11 and specific drive models.

I also wonder why there is no FAQ on troubleshooting corrupt image problems, since this seems to be far and away the most common issue with ATI.

 

You seem to have isolated the issue to the drive by substitution. I don’t recall any issues with PATA drives in a IDE connection. From time to time USB issues surface for a variety of reasons.

Have you considered formatting the drive and starting over?

If you haven’t done so you might run the Seagate SeaTools diagnostic utility to check the drive, available here:

http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/seatools/

EDIT: To download SeaTools for DOS you will need to register with Seagate as a part of the process. The current version is 2.07 and is available in a floppy download or as an ISO image. This does not appear to support USB drives. I have not tried the Windows version.

 

Thanks for the suggestion. I downloaded the SeaTools utility and the drive checks OK using both the short and the long tests.

I also put the drive back into an old computer and ran it with ATI 8 - it worked perfectly.

It appears that this is an issue specific to ATI 11 with this model drive.

 

Curiouser and curiouser....

If I install the drive in another computer running TI 8 and create an image, it verifies OK. If I then take the drive and put it back into the computer running TI 11, the exact same image fails verification.

 

I am not sure what that proves because there is no stated compatability of V11 back to V8.

You could try validating the V8 image in the V11 by booting from a V8 recovery CD. But I am not sure what a pass or fail would really mean.

Xpilot

 

Take the TI11 boot disk and boot the old computer with it and try to validate the image on the old computer. If it doesn't valdiate then there likely (but not without some uncertaintly) a problem with TI11 and that drive.

If it does valdiate then you could have a marginal RAM problem that memtest doesn't pickup (unlikely) or other problem on the new PC such as something running too fast (?). There was a report of limiting RAM size on the boot CD version on startup solving a validate problem but yours is somewhat strange because it only happens with a particular drive. The fact that it also happens under Windows rules out Linux driver issues.

 

Repartitioned and reformatted the drive. Still can't create an image on it.

 

Does it make a difference if the drive is formatted as NTFS or FAT32? Have you tried both?

Does it make a difference if you use the option to lower the disk throughput (Options->Backup performance->HDD writing speed)?

If you copy a large file from C: (or the USB drive) to the hard drive, does the MD5 checksum value on the file remain the same? If you copy it back from the drive, does it remain the same?

 

I have the same problem with my USB drive. I cannot create a full backup that passes validation. I have tried just about everything that you have, plus I have tried breaking the archive in to pieces as small as 100 MB. I sent a question to support the day before yesterday but have heard nothing back yet. It's the weekend.

Interestingly, I can create a good backup of "My Documents" to that drive. The archive is around 660 MB. But I need to get a full image of the drive.

 

DaveRR,
If yours is a laptop, I have read of power issues solved by running the usb drive from its own power source--not using power from laptop.

Also, if desktop, try using an alternate connector on rear of case.
Have you tried a better usb cable. Shorter is better.

LSU Engineer,

Can you temporarily replace the IDE drive with another and does the replacement have the same issues?

Have you tried running the SATA in IDE mode from the Bios?

 

I have the same problem. I try ATI 11 with internal disks (SATA), i change all cables and i try it through firewire and USB 2 interface from an Seagate 750 GB external. I spend all my weekend to that and i always get the same message after the creation of backup and while the ATI make the verification ...image corrupted!
I use vista and i do not know what to do....

 

LSU Engineer,

I have a couple of additional thoughts about your problem. Since your corruption problem only occurs in the new PC, and with consideration for the checks that you have made, one has to ask what other factors could be contributing. Two thoughts come to mind since creating an image certainly works the PC very hard.
1. Excessively high temperature [hard drive(s), CPU etc.].
2. A voltage that is out of specification, particularily when under load.

To monitor some of these parameters I use a utility from Lavalys called Everest Ultimate Edition. They have a trial version but it doesn’t include many parameters (hard drive temps as an example). Their web site is here and screen shot of my system’s sensor page follows. A full report is over 100 pages.
http://www.lavalys.com/

 

It was formatted as FAT32 and I reformatted as NTFS. It behaves the same either way.

Lowering the HDD writing speed doesn't change the behavior.

With regard to copying a large file.... If I create an ATI 11 image (30-50GB) on another drive and copy it in Windows to F:, it fails both Acronis and MD5 checksum verification EVERY TIME. It doesn't matter whether it is connected internally via IDE or externally in a USB enclosure.

However, if I can copy an entire directory of video files (average 4GB each, 90GB total) and there is not a single checksum error in any file!

I am suspecting that it has to something to do with creating a single large image file. Some combination of the ATI 11 file format, chipset driver (and/or the drive firmware?) just do not play well together.

 

So summarizing, if you copy 4 GB files in Windows Explorer to the suspect hard disk, there are no checksum errors.

If you copy a 30 GB file in Windows Explorer to the suspect hard disk there are checksum errors, but the 30 GB file just happens to be a True Image backup archive. Is it the .tib file format that causes the problem or is it just the size of the file?

What happens if you stuff eight or ten of the 4 GB files into a zip archive and copy the resultant large file to the suspect disk in Windows Explorer?

 

Thanks for the suggestions.

The USB drive does run from its own power source.

I have tried another USB cable.

I don't have another IDE drive for testing.

"...running the SATA in IDE mode from the Bios"? Are you referring to the BIOS setting for running the laptop's internal drive in "enhanced" mode?

It's now been five days, and I have received nothing from Acronis other than a boilerplate "we'll get to you" email. I'm going to start looking for how to get a refund.

 

DaveRR,
Sorry to confuse you. The last part of my response was directed to the LSU Engineer which started this thread.

 

Yes, I have replaced the drive with another, and the alternate drive does not have the issue.

Acronis support also suggested changing the SATA mode, and I tried it but the result is the same - corrupt images. Note that while the drive I am imaging is SATA, the target drive is not.

Thanks for the suggestions

 

I don't think it has anything to do with the fact it is an image file created by TI; the problem is your system doesn't handle very large files correctly.

The reason I say the above:
If you run a 3rd party checksum calculator on the tib or any file, it goes through the file computing the checksum of the contents and displays the result. It doesn't care what the contents really are and if they make sense. You now copy the file and run the same calculation process again, if the file is unaltered then the checksum will be the same. Your test shows that the file is changed by the copy process for some reason. Also, since you are doing this in Windows the dreaded Linux driver problem is out of the picture.

A corrupt archive error in TI is the result of a checksum calculation although there are 4000 checksums compared for each GB of data. The corrupt archive message really means TI can't open the file and re-calculate all the checksums and get them all exactly the same. AFAIK, there is no analysis of the file contents other than to read and calculate checksums.

I would say that your replacement of the IDE target drive indicates there is a problem with the original drive for very large files.