Diamondmax + nForce4 = Incompatible?

[Newf]

I can confirm the nForce 4 chipset works with Maxtor Diamond Max drives, as I've used many, with various firmwares.
All I can say, is check it with PowerMax as the HDD may very well be defective. (On an Intel chipset based system if you need to - you are a tech, act like one and stop crying. Real techs always have one of each system, if not more)...

I'm glad you have had good luck with Maxtor drives. As it turns out, so have I. Some, including a gaming oriented PC magazine, have not. I did not know I was crying about this. I posted some news I read while looking at upgrade options, hoping for feedback (like yours) that could clarify why Maximum PC would not recommend Maxtor drives for nF4 chipset motherboards. It turns out that this is a bigger issue than I thought although it has an easy solution. As I said before:
Many people come to this forum looking for advice on building an awesome nForce4 gaming rig. It seems to me that steering them away from a serious glitch when alternatives are available makes sense.

 

[eyessack]

So I decided to build a computer and I happened to order a Maxtor HDD and an nforce4 motherboard. I recently recieved all the parts and I had planned to start building it tomorrow. It wasn't until after I placed my order that i found out about the issue with the hard drive's and motherboard's compatibility. I'm contemplating whether I should not even take the hard drive out of the wrapper and get a refund so I can order a Western Digital or make an attempt and see what happens. The hard drive model is 6L250SO and the motherboard is an ASUS A8N5X with the nforce4 chipset. What should I do?

 

[Newf]

The short answer is that I don't know what you should do...

The 6L250S0 is not listed by Maxtor as a problem drive.
Most (not all but most) people do not have failed drives, even those who have to run them in SATA150 mode which will work OK.
Returning the drive (even unopened) will cost you money, at least for shipping.

On the other hand:
If you have the time to wait for it, a WD drive WILL work flawlessly.
The cost to changeover is not prohibitive.

I'd put the odds at 80%/20% that the Maxtor will work out OK for you.
If it were me, I'd trade the time and a few $ to get a different drive that I knew would work without hassles of any kind. But I have the time and $.
It's up to you to weigh the above and decide what to do.
That's the best I can do.

 

[Yan]

Im using a Maxtor DM10 6V300F0 on a MSI K8n Neo4-f and am having a hard time with it. I get a lot of data corruption, to the point where i cannot install certain games, download large files or burn DVD's. My system also locks up from time to time and my HD is not recognized on reboot, a few minutes off line usually fix the problem. I see that im not the only one, but neither Maxtor or Nvidia are helping, and i can't flash my HD since i have a NF4 board. This is the last Maxtor product i ever buy, i had to return this one 3 times before i got one running, and now this. Im getting a Seagate 7200.10 drive tomorrow and will sell this one once whatever non-corrupted data i have left on it is transfered..

 

[elianda]

I have a 6V250F0 and got the 'disappearing HDD' problem. This appears when writing to the HDD within 50 GB of data it occurs about 95% estimated. On reading it appears too but very rarely my estimation is to 95% on a transfer of 300 GB.
chkdsk with 'find bad sectors' freezes.


But I own a nForce590SLI Intel. Thats not all, I also plugged the drive on a VIA KT600 Chipset (Asus A7V600-E) and got the identical problem.
So the point that the problem only appears with nForce chipsets is obviously wrong!

I am going to check out the drive on some more chipsets as I get my hands on. Until then I am waiting for a response from the Maxtor support.

 

[Newf]

The 590i and 680i NVidia chipsets (for Intel cpus) have had issues with hard drive I/O. This is not believed to be Maxtor specific but an issue with motherboard circuitry. It also only seems to affect some boards which may suggest quality control problems, although NVidia has issued BIOS updates they claim will help.
I would guess that in your specific case that you got a bum hard drive since it fails on multiple platforms...

 

[elianda]

This might be the case but for this specific problem it is very unlikely, because:
- I have 4 other drives on the nForce590 SLI working fine.
- the Maxtor drive shows the identical problem at the KT600 chipset.

 

[Newf]

huh?

"I would guess that in your specific case that you got a bum hard drive since it fails on multiple platforms..."
So your point is?