Just got a Mega STe 4...now how do I?

[vware]

This is not a deja vu but I bought a lot of Atari ST Software and Hardware yesterday with the crown jewel being a Mega STE/4.

 

 

It came with few original games and many copied disks. I must say, I could not believe when I saw this lot for sale and drove 2 hours to get it!!

 

 

 

The Mega STe turnout to be the 4MB/40MB version and it is in mint condition. However, it will not boot from the hard drive and Drive icon is missing. I can see the drive LED blinking during the startup and I even tried using the AHDI.PRG to revive it, but it only shows me drive information and quits.

I would like to preserve the content of the drive if possible. Any ideas...

 

[+Guitarman]

Make sure the computer is off. In the area where the HDD is, give it a couple of good solid taps with your knuckles. See if you can get the drive to respond. You can usually tell if the drive is spinning up because you'll definitely hear it. The key is hearing that the drive spins up fairly quickly. If it doesn't, the computer will not sense it and end up at the desktop. If you can't get it to spin up, try giving it a couple of good solid taps with the computer on and see if you hear it spin up. If so, just press the reset button instead of turning it off and on and see if the drive loads. If it does, let the computer ist turned on for a while to let the bearings in the drive loosen up. Then, if it locks up at a later time, a couple of taps should get it going. That's what I have to do with the one I got. If I let it sit a day or so, I have to 'assist' it in starting up!! LOL

 

For backup of the contents, get yourself an UltraSatan, if you don't have one. That will probably be the best backup solution for large amounts of data. The was my intent when I fried mine doing the firmware upgrade!! It's being repaired at this time.

[tjlazer]

Cool, are you in Seattle? How is the Mega STE going? I have some TOS 2.06 chips for that Mega STE if you want a set... I am right down the road from you.

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Well, some hints for not working hard drive: best what you can do is to run driver from floppy. There are free versions of hard disk drivers around, so can DL and copy to floppy and run.

OK, I see that you already tried AHDI.PRG. But it recognises not all formats. Better get ICD Pro drivers - it is now freeware.

 

Then, if it recognises drive, and even some partition(s) on it there is hope. Likely only bootsector is damaged, and possible to fix with driver install. But should see files immediately, if they are not damaged. Recommended to save as soon as possible - disk is for sure not much reliable.

If no partitions detected only what can do is to try to partition. That needs usually full version of driver SW. And if partitioning fails, better forget that drive and get something new(er).

 

Don't know is it worth to try to make image of that disk, before partitioning, to save possible data on. For that you need SCSI adapter in PC and simple imaging SW.

[Zogging Hell]

I would say tapping it around should be last resort , as well as sticking it in the freezer maybe. The tapping might loosen a drive that has frozen/ ceased up due to inactivity, but might also cause a head crash particularly if the drive isn't autoparking (or wasn't parked prior to storage) which isn't going to help much.

 

It might be worth checking the drive itself for any damage (dead capacitors if it has any etc.) and open her up and check nothing has come loose in transit. If you open up the part of the case which holds the hard drive (you don't need to take all the top off), stick your fingers on the drive and listen closely when you power up. If there is a clicking sound (the click of death) you might be out of luck. You will at least be able to check the drive is getting power. What version of ADHI were you using?

[GadgetUK]

Worth checking if the drive spins up - power it whilst holding it and see if you can feel it spinning. On some old drive the spindle sticks due to wear of the contacts inside - sometimes a sharp twist of the drive in your hand can get it to start up if that's the problem. Old seagate drives used to suffer from that a lot, but it tended to be older MFM drives (pre IDE).