Hard drive issues, please help!

[vwgtiturbo]

Hello, I have a system I used everyday with no issues. Recently, I noticed that the HDD activity indicator would be solid and stay solid, after about a minute of boot up. No breaks, constantly solid, even when nothing should be accessing the drive. Eventually, the system will grind to a halt and lock.

I've tried reinstalling, and usually, the system will lock, or I'll get some error that prevents the installation from completing. I've redownloaded/burned LM9, tried Ubuntu 10.04, OpenSuse 11.2, and LM9, and usually, the installation fails, but on the rare occasion that the install succeeds, I am met with this solid LED, system lockup issue.

In addition to the multiple OSs, I've tried other hard drives, and nothing seems to get rid of the issue. I even went as far as removing memory one stick at a time, still, no go. Different SATA channel on the mobo, new SATA cable, reloading settings in the CMOS... NOTHING has changed this.

One thing to add... once the HDD LED lights up solid, the CD Tray won't open. I can push the button all day, and it will just sit there, laughing at me, lol

This is what I see in my syslog when the LED issue happens:
Aug 6 14:23:57 LM9-RD kernel: [ 66.804023] ata3: lost interrupt (Status 0x51)
Aug 6 14:24:02 LM9-RD kernel: [ 71.804027] ata3.01: qc timeout (cmd 0xa0)
Aug 6 14:24:02 LM9-RD kernel: [ 71.804036] ata3.01: exception Emask 0x0 SAct 0x0 SErr 0x0 action 0x6 frozen
Aug 6 14:24:02 LM9-RD kernel: [ 71.804040] sr 2:0:1:0: CDB: Test Unit Ready: 00 00 00 00 00 00
Aug 6 14:24:02 LM9-RD kernel: [ 71.804051] ata3.01: cmd a0/00:00:00:00:00/00:00:00:00:00/b0 tag 0
Aug 6 14:24:02 LM9-RD kernel: [ 71.804053] res 51/20:03:00:00:00/00:00:00:00:00/b0 Emask 0x5 (timeout)
Aug 6 14:24:02 LM9-RD kernel: [ 71.804056] ata3.01: status: { DRDY ERR }
Aug 6 14:24:02 LM9-RD kernel: [ 71.804076] ata3: soft resetting link
Aug 6 14:24:05 LM9-RD kernel: [ 74.656014] Clocksource tsc unstable (delta = -69837825 ns)
Aug 6 14:24:08 LM9-RD kernel: [ 77.084152] ata3.01: qc timeout (cmd 0xa1)
Aug 6 14:24:08 LM9-RD kernel: [ 77.084164] ata3.01: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4)
Aug 6 14:24:08 LM9-RD kernel: [ 77.084170] ata3.01: revalidation failed (errno=-5)
Aug 6 14:24:13 LM9-RD kernel: [ 82.124022] ata3: link is slow to respond, please be patient (ready=0)
Aug 6 14:24:18 LM9-RD kernel: [ 87.108021] ata3: device not ready (errno=-16), forcing hardreset
Aug 6 14:24:18 LM9-RD kernel: [ 87.108034] ata3: soft resetting link
Aug 6 14:24:28 LM9-RD kernel: [ 97.320043] ata3.01: qc timeout (cmd 0xa1)
Aug 6 14:24:28 LM9-RD kernel: [ 97.320057] ata3.01: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4)
Aug 6 14:24:28 LM9-RD kernel: [ 97.320063] ata3.01: revalidation failed (errno=-5)
Aug 6 14:24:33 LM9-RD kernel: [ 102.360023] ata3: link is slow to respond, please be patient (ready=0)
Aug 6 14:24:38 LM9-RD kernel: [ 107.344022] ata3: device not ready (errno=-16), forcing hardreset
Aug 6 14:24:38 LM9-RD kernel: [ 107.344036] ata3: soft resetting link
Aug 6 14:25:08 LM9-RD kernel: [ 137.556040] ata3.01: qc timeout (cmd 0xa1)
Aug 6 14:25:08 LM9-RD kernel: [ 137.556054] ata3.01: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4)
Aug 6 14:25:08 LM9-RD kernel: [ 137.556060] ata3.01: revalidation failed (errno=-5)
Aug 6 14:25:08 LM9-RD kernel: [ 137.556068] ata3.01: disabled
Aug 6 14:25:13 LM9-RD kernel: [ 142.596023] ata3: link is slow to respond, please be patient (ready=0)
Aug 6 14:25:18 LM9-RD kernel: [ 147.580018] ata3: device not ready (errno=-16), forcing hardreset
Aug 6 14:25:18 LM9-RD kernel: [ 147.580030] ata3: soft resetting link
Aug 6 14:25:18 LM9-RD kernel: [ 147.747331] ata3: EH complete

Any ideas of what else I can try? This system worked a treat until one day, it just started locking up. I am at a loss...

Thanks in advance for any assistance.

[jackpal]

I could be one of two things. First it could be your SATA controller is going bad. This would be the worst case scenario because you would probably have to replace the motherboard. Second your hard disk is going bad. That is the best case scenario because it easier to replace a disk. My advice is to do basic troubleshooting. Replace the hard drive and see if your issues go away. If not then you need to start thinking about a new board or a new SATA controller.

[vwgtiturbo]

Hello there, as noted above, in addition to the multiple OSs, I tried this on three or so drives with no change, so that pretty much told me that it was a board issue. I did end up solving this, but I'm still not sure how it came up out of nowhere. I changed an APIC setting in the BIOS and tried reinstalling AGAIN and all is well.