[mythtv-users] OT: SATA errors

[Brian Wood]

On Wednesday 08 July 2009 20:50:29 Harry Devine wrote:

> I was finally able to run fsck from the live CD on all of my partitions,
> and it fixed some errors.  But I get the same errors upon boot up.  I
> will try the Hard Drive in another machine tomorrow when I have some
> time and see if that's it.  I think I have a spare power supply laying
> around that I could try too.  Why would the power supply be a potential
> problem?  Wouldn't the box not boot at all if the PS was bad?  Or is it
> just not putting out enough juice to spin up the drives?  Just curious
> as to how the 2 areas connect, that's all.

As Marc said there are all sorts of problems you can have with power supplies, 
either due to poor design or component failure. 

Intuitively you would think that the machine would not boot with a bad supply, 
but I have seen many cases where this was not so. Drives draw maximum current 
as the motors spin up, but other things can cause the load to increase (CPU 
clocking up, as was mentioned).

I don't really think your problem is with your PSU, but I mentioned it as a 
remote possibility. I can't tell you how many "odd" problems have turned out 
in the end to be PSU related.

Power supplies are the first place manufacturers scrimp to save costs. Buyers 
almost never look at the PSU when  making a purchase decision, and the 
difference in cost between a good quality unit and a cheapie is large.

I cringe every time I see something like "600 watt power supply - $19.99". 

-- 
Brian Wood
beww at beww.org