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Alrighty, I have a COMPAQ DeskPro 2000 5120 or something resembling one. It has 2 hard drives, both Western Digitals, 2.4 GB and 1.2 GB. Just recently (i.e. about 15 minutes ago), I started receiving a message at BIOS bootup: 1720 IntelliSafe Hard Disk detects imminent failure. I figured this meant that it thought my hard drive (which one?) was about to crash. An internet search confirmed this, but told me very little. The hard drives seem to be normal otherwise... I have noticed no difference in their operation. However, I have no clue which drive is about to fail... or of it's possible that IntelliSafe is pulling a false alarm. Additionally, if a crash is imminent, how long might I have? Does anyone have experience in this area?
Perhaps I'm just very unlucky, but I've had 2 hard drives crash before, which I treated similarly: a 1.2 GB JTS Corp Palladium and a 342 MB Seagate. On both of these drives, I had them spin down when they were idle. On this COMPAQ, power management is enabled, so they spin down automatically. I posted previously about how it didn't seem exactly like a coincidence that 2 drives had crashed when I'd been using them for awhile with spindown enabled when they were idle.
Well, they didn't exactly crash. They developed bad sectors at an astonishing rate and eventually became so unreliable that I could not put data on them without it being corrupted; and that was aside from the bad sectors already on it.
Chris,
I had the very same thing happen with a Deskpro 5100. It is a Compaq bug. Read about it here, upgrading your firmware may solve your problem.
http://www3.compaq.com/support/reference_library/viewdocument.asp?source=DH990309_CW01.xml&dt=3
Hth,
Michael
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Thank you, Michael...
I had looked on the website and found a utility that would upgrade firmware on a specific WDC drive that would generate the same symptoms I was getting, but it didn't apply to the drive I had.
Also, the problem fixed itself. I think. I thought that it was the 2.5 GB drive that went nuts, so I repartitioned the 1.2 GB drive and made a DOS partition to back up all my files to; when I rebooted so changes could take effect and I could FORMAT it, the error did not display again. Weee, the problem shut up and left... but naturally I'm still paranoid that my drives _WILL_ crash.
Anyway, if it is a COMPAQ bug, why would it show up spontaneously like that, when I'd been using the computer in the same way for about a month? Sounds like something Windoze would do.
Thanks,
-Chris
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It's a Compaq bug because of the way they always use diagnostic partitions to run BIOS functions that normal PCs run out of the CMOS memory. If you've ever wiped your Compaq diagnostic partition accidentally, you know how much of a pain it is to get it working again. And yes I've have seen where it shows up spontaneously like that... No warning or ryhme or reason, one day there's no message and the next day it pops up.... I'm glad you got it working again though.
-Michael
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It's probably a firmware issue of the WD drive. There are several Softpacks on the Compaq site to solve this problem for your drive.
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Help!!I am having the same problem. But I installed a new Maxtor drive. All of the Softpacks are for WD drives. Can anyone point me in the right direction??
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SHAWN,
THIS MAY BE A SOLUTION FOR YOUR PROBLEM.
GO TO GOOGLE.COM AND TYPE IN SP10312.THIS
IS A SOFTPAC FOR THE MAXTOR DRIVES.
GOOD LUCK!
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My Western Digital gives me a IntelliSafe detects imminent failure what should I do? I have a Compaq Presario 7360
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Help!!! My Compaq is doing the same thing. When I boot it up, it says error 1720, Hard Drive detects immenent failure. Then I boot it up and it loads, but it stops every couple seconds when I am trying to do stuff. it says that I have a QUANTUM BIGFOOT TS12.7A Hard Drive, and I dont know what to do!!! Someone please help!!!
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I forgot something: I dont know if it helps, but when running Compaq Diagnostics, it says Failure: IntelliSafe Parameter exceeded threshold. Im not sure what this means, but maybe you guys do.
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I started receiving message: 1720- Hard drive imminent failure, and 2 options F1 boot
F 10 Computer Setup. Since I have no any idea how to setup, I pick boot and everything goes normally. Unfortunately,I do not know consequnces of my actions. Could you tell me what is wrong with my computer?
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I change out about 5 drives a month on Compaq Deskpro EN 733,866, and 1GHZ machines.
We have about 800 of those here.
They are both Maxtor and Western Digital (usually 20GB). Compaq sends me a replacement disk under warrenty and everything is cool. So far we have never lost any data. This is much better than waiting for the disk to grind to a halt, that's for sure. On the Deskpro EN machines there is a utility in the BOIS that checks the drive out for you. It's called ide dps or something like that. We get a code 4 on most of the bad disks.
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When a computer is started up, it performs the POST, during which several hardware devices are tested to make sure they are operating properly. If any device fails the POST, an error code is generated. Almost all modern hard drives include technology called S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology) which can detect signs that the drive is about to fail. The drive will then notify the system, resulting in the error message. try the BIOS update for the model or any other hard drive update for this model. If the error message persists, please replace the hard drive or contact the nearest Compaq Care Center.
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