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Paul [Nelson]... You'll have to define "stiction" ... <smile>


I'm the "wrong" Paul, but we've had "stiction" over the years...

When a disk has been spinning 24x7x52xN and you power off the machine, very often the disk will not spin back up again. There are 2 potential causes-- (a) lubrication of the bearings is 'gummy' and the motor is not powerful enough to overcome the friction (the disk is 'stuck,' hence STuck+frICTION); (b) in early disks there was actually a dedicated track on the disk where the heads physically touched down on the disk surface when it was powered off. The heads sometimes would stick to the disk surface, and once again couldn't spin back up.

Solutions to Sticktion:

IF YOU TRY THESE METHODS (other than (a)) I'M NOT RESPONSIBLE IF YOUR SYSTEM IS TOTALLY DEAD FOREVER!!!

(a) never turn off your disk drives

(b) cycle the power several times in quick succession [flip the power on/off/on/off/on rapidly] in the hopes that the pulses of power will overcome inertia and friction (like 'rocking' a vehicle out of a snow bank).

(c) use percussive maintenance on the offending drive (ie give the drive a good >THWACK< on the side with either the heel of your hand or a blunt instrument) in the hope that the impact will jar things loose.

--Paul E Musselman
PaulMmn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

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