MSI K7T Master-S

[Sean]

I've lost not one but two of these boards :evil:

Clicky for larger but not necessarily more useful image.



The rest of the caps are ok, just the five clustered by the CPU socket are bad. Can't remember the values offhand, I'll check em when I get home.

:evil:

[Topcat]

That would be an easy recap. Using quality caps, it will never be an issue again!! Time to break out the soldering iron...

If ya don't want to attempt it, I can recap it and so can KC8ADU. Feel free to shoot either one of us a PM.

[willawake]

Nice case by the way, guess you were serving off that. I am also an unhappy ex-customer of MSI. Actually looking at your setup, I have had a lot of unexpected failures with quantum drives on my lan. I am replacing them with western digital. Fine so far but i can maybe tell you a different story in 2 years.

[Sean]

Yeah, it's really frustrating. It's my webserver, I run about 14 domains out of my house (just as a hobby and not as a commercial endeavour). Then again, you get what you pay for and the boards were under 50 bucks a pop so what can I say.

Though I suppose there is something to be said for the board, it still works, surprisingly. I've since moved my web services to a different machine with an Intel mobo, but this machine is still running and cranking out RC5 blocks. You may have noticed the fire extinguisher close at hand.

The case is an Antec 2U26ATX300XPR, it's pretty sweet except at 26 inches deep it won't fit in my cabinet :roll:. Have three cheapo 2u Skyhawk cases and a Chenbro RM212 as well.

You are right, it does look like a pretty easy recap. I will probably do it myself even though my eyes aren't all that great. If I burn my fingers one too many times I'll give one of you a holler.

Thanks for the replies, and KC8ADU de N3IJW

[Sean]

I have had a lot of unexpected failures with quantum drives on my lan. I am replacing them with western digital. Fine so far but i can maybe tell you a different story in 2 years.

I love Quantum scsi drives. Haven't had such good luck with their IDE drives, though. And the word "Bigfoot" still makes me recoil in horror. But their SCSI drives r0x0r my s0x0rs, i've deployed dozens of them with no failures (yet). WD I used to despise, but they have come around nicely. There was a time when you couldn't give me a new WD drive, now I run them in most of my machines at home.

[willawake]

Yeah, that is interesting cos i have a HP netserver LC3 with two quantum uw scsi 10gb disks (raid-1). That is a PII 300. Has been running netware 4.11 for I dont want to think how long 24/7. Was delivered with 1 drive with bad clusters but we found out and replaced it. My previous post was referring to the IDE drives (Fireballs). I used to get offered WD all the time but refused. Now i install them exclusively and anyway there is just so much availability here in Greece for WD now. Their diagnostic utility I think is quite honest. I scan everything I receive. Have returned two drives so far out of many because they failed the test. I gave quantum a chance when they became maxtor but have one 80gb at home which developed extremely slow access accross some partitions. Strange.

lol bigfoot ....brings back memories..

will you post urls for your hosted sites?

[dood]

Yeah, we've had tons of the older quantum fireball IDE drives crap out in Gateway E-3200 machines. There was one chip that would consistantly catch on fire in those drives (quite literally... burn a hole in the middle of the chip)

[Topcat]

I stopped using quantum HDD's in my server just for that reason... I had a few SCSI ones go tits up on me, of course at the worst possible times.... I moved up to Fujitsu SCSI's and have yet to have a failure!

[Sean]

The way I see it, all drives will eventually fail, and it's just a matter of being aware of that and having a contingency plan. And sometimes it's simply a matter of picking the drive that has the best warranty (and RMA process). Oh, and a little RAID lovin' definitely can't hurt.

Fujitsu makes an insanely great enterprise SCSI drive...the same cannot be said for their desktop drives. But no manufacturer is immune, one could make a case for or against any HDD manufacturer in business today. Heck, last year one of my customers had a newish Seagate Cheetah X15 headcrash, looked like someone had taken a Dremel to the top platter.

I pretty much use Seagate and Quantum SCSI drives exclusively in production machines, choices based on cost, performance, and my own personal experience. Well, that and Ebay is just flooded with gazillions of Cheeti and Atlii. Really, who can say no to five SCA Atlas 10Ks for a c-note particularly on a typical geek's budget.

I've pulled WD ATA drives out of the bag only to find them DOA but still use them at home. Had IBM Deathstars run full bore for years without so much as an odd click or bad sector, and I have two 120GXPs that have been clickin' like crazy ever since I installed them. Ultrastars that ran so hot I was afraid the solder joints on the logic boards would melt but somehow manage to endure.

Anyway those are just my preferences.

Ok, I think we've dragged this thread sufficiently off topic :mrgreen:

[Topcat]

Yeah, it went from a capacitor failure to HDD failures.... I have to agree that Fujitsu makes the best enterprise drives, plus they have a full 5 year warranty. A HDD is mechanical, thus doomed to fail eventually... I run Adaptec 2100S Ultra160 RAID controllers with the Fujitsu's... Makes a great setup...

Specs: http://www.kabalsrealm.com/systems/server_1/

Funny you mention IBM's that click... I've got a pair of 120GXP's that have done that since the day I installed them new in a RAID1 array on one of my VP6's... This was 2 years ago, and they still work...

Yeah, now we're WAY off topic... Maybe someone will pick up a tidbit or two from it...

Ohh yeah, post some of those sites you host, I'd like to take a peek too...

[Sean]

Sure, here's a couple:

http://chaosnetwork.org/sysinfo
http://rieselsieve.com
http://ultimatechaos.com
http://n3ijw.org

The rest are just development/test sites primarily. Nothing terribly exciting but it keeps me fairly busy. Time spent learning is never wasted!

I run my 120GXPs on a VP6 as well...CO-EENKY-DINK? Had that board forever it seems, running two CuMine 700s at 933MHz 24/7/365 serving files, mail, and running a remote syslog daemon for my FreeBSD boxes. It's been rebooting itself every so often, think it just needs a beefier PSU though, didn't notice any swollen caps (yet).

Oh, nice Fairlady Z!

[kc8adu]

the constant clicking is the firmware keeping the heads moving to prevent any localised overheating of the platters.
yes there is an air gap but at 10-15k there is enough friction to cause overheating if the heads park in one place and stay there when idle.

[Topcat]

HMM I didn't know that.... The wierd part is that both drives do this simultaneously (when one does it, the other does too), almost as if the controller is the cause....

Sean,
Nice site designs. Badcaps itself was the lab rat for a bunch of stuff... It's a hybrid of quite a few interesting goodies....

[Sean]

My Cheetahs at work have the regular thermal-recalibration clicking sound ADU is referring to. The IBMs, however, are 7200rpm ATA drives and their cringe-inducing clicking can best be described as "Do not put anything important on this drive". A third 120GXP in that machine doesn't have the click. But they all still work and have no bad sectors so I'm not going to lose any sleep over it.

[Sean]

Just to give this thread some closure, thanks to Topcat for hookin' a brother up! Recapped board works better than new.

[clsk]

The IBMs, however, are 7200rpm ATA drives and their cringe-inducing clicking can best be described as "Do not put anything important on this drive".

heh i know that sound, i hade 2 60gig ibm (deckstars??) 1 died a year after i bought it and the other is is on its last leg, turning it on alone emmits a high pitched squeeling noise, and every now and then ill get the click click click noise, i just use this hard drive to test machines, of course i cover it in blankets and pillows cause the sounds are horrible

[willawake]

For the record i put 2 seagate ata drives into a raid 1 array for backup purposes only (cant be bothered with tapes anymore for daily backups. My first experience with seagate drives (getting huge availability now here in Greece and less WD. Everything was looking good but next day drive1 failed to respond in the required time, and the next day...(try to keep the event log nice). That drive passed the seatools inspection. Just ditched those drives and put WD instead. The seatools inspection was way too slow on 40gb to be considered for further installations. Forget 250gb. I check all HDs with full test before installation, the ram too. WD Diag is much faster. Kudos to seagate for those nice plastic protective trays (while WD still in oem bags) . Still a WD fan. No more Deathstars, no maxtors. Will try the Fujitsu's but seen no availability in my area. HDD a major consideration for installations. Any little lack of trust and its gone. Especially on critical systems.

[Sean]

Any little lack of trust and its gone. Especially on critical systems.

Yup, same here. That's why it took me like five years before I started purchasing WD drives again

My critical systems get RAID 1 or 5, scsi or ide. My most critical machine has mirrored 36GB Cheetah X15s and nightly near-line backups to a mirrored ATA set and nightly Onstream ADR2 tape backups with tapes stored in a fireproof safe and one tape per week stored offsite. Can never overprotect your data!

[willawake]

Nice setup Sean, yes I really wanted Seagate to work because of the growing availabilty here. Will try some on the desktops later. Computer shops getting all Seagate marketing materials and stock. Why, I have no idea. I am using Backup Magic for those daily paranoia backups.

http://www.moonsoftware.com/bmagic.asp

With the mirror function you can backup the daily changed files on a big set just while you go for a piss before you leave work. Check the error log and go home and sleep well. Gonna get some IDE removable cages and forget tape forever soon. For the daily stuff, got a backup magic mirror and a incremental for the deleters.