I have an older maxtor hard drive and when the computer starts up is says "1720-Hard drive detects imminent failure" and says hit F1 to boot or F10 to enter computer setup. When i hit F1 and I select the OS that is on that hard drive (win 2000) it boots fine. I dont seem to have any problems when i'm running win 2000 on it. Any idea's why its giving me that message?

i don't know what would give you that message but it's probably not a good sign. first i would back up any data that i wanted to keep asap so if it does fail you'll have your stuff. next i would run chkdsk to see if there are any errors on the drive that might be causing it. a harddrive diagnostic test might be good to try and diagnose the problem too. i think you can get a boot version for maxtor drives, check at the maxtor homepage. Someone else will almost certainly be along later to give you more info too.

I did a chkdsk and it found no errors. Also I went to maxtor and download powermax and it check the hard drive integrity. the only thing that did not pass on any of the test was the "SMART attribute check".

That errot you are getting is the S.M.A.R.T. technology kicking in. The error may mean complete failure, or it may mean a couple of sectors are peeling off the platter, which is fairly normal for an older drive.

If you find it annoying, go in to your bios and disable S.M.A.R.T. Keep a CDRW to save your files onto, or use the drive on a different computer over a network until you have time/money to get a new one.

But it could very well be one of those things where your check engine light comes on in your car when you are low on windshield wiper fluid. Still, better safe than sorry.

I would follow the advice of imnuts and back up your data. Could be an error you are getting from a cold start that will pass the test after it has come up to speed and warmed up. Imminent means it is coming but who knows when.

1720 is a smart drive indication foreseeing the drive failing (could be many things such as badblocks allocation - running out) It's giving you ample time to replace the disk before it goes catastrophic.

well I have everything back up because I am on a network. But another words the thing is gonna die anytime, right?

yeah, i would be ready to buy a new drive and have it ready. the only problem is that it could be today, it could be in 6 months.

they need to find a way to put a clock on hardware that counts down to the time of complete failure and inability to be used further so we know when something like the hard drive is going to just quit.

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they need to find a way to put a clock on hardware that counts down to the time of complete failure and inability to be used further so we know when something like the hard drive is going to just quit.

Thats basically what S.M.A.R.T. is, at least the best that can be done for hard drives.

I've had 2 Caviar 1GB drives made in '96. One died in '99. The other one still lives, sans a few sectors that peeled off.

Theres really no way to tell exactly when anything is gonna die. Same with cars, people, ideas, memories, the entire universe, etc.

Dr. Metal wrote:

well I have everything back up because I am on a network. But another words the thing is gonna die anytime, right?

Yes its coming but you nver know how long it will take could be days or weeks but its coming. Hard drive prices have come down conciderably lately so its not too bad.

I have a friend that once had this problem. It freaked them out, they called me, and I investigated. This was 2 years ago and it's still running. At one time I got the error to go away by removing the cmos battery for a few minutes and putting it back. The error did not come up again for almost a year. Let the poor fella die with dignity, transfer vital organs to a donor disc and energize the computer with the introduction of a new, error free drive. </cheezy sad music>