HDS causing Delayed Write Failed error?

[John NZ]

I think there may be a bug with HDS causing Delayed Write Failed errors, especially when copying large files to external USB drives.

Some background on this error message can be found here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/330174 and here are some other conditions that cause it: http://www.gibni.com/windows-delayed-wr ... led-solved

I have tested a brand new external HDD (with write cache disabled) on two different XP machines copying a large number of files. When HDS is enabled, the transfers eventually fail with a Delayed Write Failed error. I have repeated the same tests with HDS turned off and after hours of testing I don't get any errors.

The creators of HDS must be congratulated for what is otherwise a superb program and I hope this issue can be resolved. Get back to me if you need further input to help resolve the problem.

[hdsentinel]

Thanks for reporting the issue and thanks for your kind words about the software.

I suspect it is caused by an incompatibility between your USB external drive and the software.
Please use the Report menu Send test report to developer option so I can examine the USB drive status and the raw information and error reported by the USB chip. The report will confirm if the issue may affect other components (eg. internal disks) also.

For best result, I recommend to

1) send a report when the drive is just connected
2) perform some file copy operations until you receive the error message
3) send a new report again

Excuse me for that. I hope by the reports the issue can be fixed quickly.

For a temporary solution you may try to use Configuration -> Disk Control -> Disable detection of USB and SCSI drives

This way HDS will not touch the USB drive so I suspect there will be no such errors reported.

[John NZ]

Find attached the debug reports from both before and after the error occurred today (password for the zip file has been sent directly via separate PM).

I successful copied hundreds of Gb's of data to the usb drive over 12 hours of testing yesterday with HDS turned off. I rebooted the PC this morning, restarted HDS and the error came up after only half an hour of data transfers.

You will see that the external USB drive is a RAID1 mirror. I seem to recall the problem having also happened on a single drive setup so do I not think this is a causal factor.

The PC runs Avast anti-virus, but again I expect this is unrelated.

Hope this helps but let me know if more assistance is required.

John

[John NZ]

Grrrrrrrr - can't PM the password due to message from the forum engine saying "You cannot make another post so soon after your last."

Will try again later.

[hdsentinel]

Thanks for the file. Please just send the password in e-mail to info (at) hdsentinel (dot) com the forum engine will not cause any problems.
Sorry for the restriction, it was added to reduce spam.