HH drives

From: Alan Greenstreet <aeg_at_paradise.net.nz>
Date: Sat Apr 12 22:55:00 2003

Hi All

I have a newbie question <collective groan from list>
I don't have much experience with HH type drives and recently unearthed
a Wyse Technologies machine at the local refuse recycling centre (it's
a shop rather than me wading though a landfill site - I'm not that
desperate).

Inside this machine (stated built in 1986) were two HH type 5.25" hard
drives (one a Segate ST-251 the other not branded but built 1989).

On boot up I get:
Pheonix 80386 ROM BIOS version 3.53
(c) 1985, 1986 Pheonix Technologies Ltd
640K Base 1408K Extended Memory
Hard Disk Failure

I have booted the system using a floppy and one drive (the unbranded
one) is partially readable.
It is a 41Mb drive split into two partitions (primary & extended) -
FAT16 system
It seems to have been installed with DRDOS.
Using my later versions of DOS on floppy I cannot get the drive to
respond to any standard commands (I always get a 'Sector not found'
error).
Can anything be done to revive these disks or were they left unparked
and now physically damaged?

I have another 5.25" hard drive displaying the same unresponsive
characteristics... are they all dead?

Thanks in advance

Alan
Received on Sat Apr 12 2003 - 22:55:00 BST