Creating a dead HDD?

[Fenaughty]

As part of my job involves creating a reason for my department to get new hardware, we are running on HP Vectra VE's that are 6 years old. I need to know if there is a non intrusive method for creating a corrupt HDD.

It's a sneaky method of letting the powers that be, we need an upgrade and we need it now.

I work for a large national company but in a small department that is seperated from the rest of the company due to the nature of our business. hence they don't think they need to spend the money on us.

Any ideas?????

[gooey]

a big fuck off magnet

[thingy]

If you can find at least one dud HDD, pull it apart. The reading arm is controlled by two fuckoff magnets. Just stroll around with those placing them on/near HDD's, bob's your uncle.

[Benwah]

Originally posted by Fenaughty
As part of my job involves creating a reason for my department to get new hardware, we are running on HP Vectra VE's that are 6 years old. I need to know if there is a non intrusive method for creating a corrupt HDD.

It's a sneaky method of letting the powers that be, we need an upgrade and we need it now.

I work for a large national company but in a small department that is seperated from the rest of the company due to the nature of our business. hence they don't think they need to spend the money on us.

Any ideas?????

How about a comprehensive well thought out report on why you need an upgrade and how it would improve productivity? don't waste hardware (unless it is REALLY old) it could be useful, PLUS your management would give you brownie points for effort! just a thought anyway mate.

[chip256]

Microwaves are good. 10 sec. should be enough *bing* ;)

alternatively, when hdds are plugged in sometimes the pins bend. maybe you could use that?

[Fenaughty]

Originally posted by Benwah
How about a comprehensive well thought out report on why you need an upgrade and how it would improve productivity? don't waste hardware (unless it is REALLY old) it could be useful, PLUS your management would give you brownie points for effort! just a thought anyway mate.

A comprehensive well thought out report was put together and has been through all levels of management. It has been considered but they still don't want to help. Unless it becomes critical and the customers are suffering then they may do something. we run on PII 200mhz machines with 4gb HDD, even upgrading the HDD is an issue as our tech guys supplied 40GB drives and the machines can't support them as CMOS has no further upgrades for these machines.

Therefore killing one HDD a week will wake up the numerous project groups who cant get off their ass and make a decision.
This has been going on for 8 months and My direct management is looking for a fast track way of getting something done.

Magnets sound good though

[Benwah]

Originally posted by Fenaughty
A comprehensive well thought out report was put together and has been through all levels of management. It has been considered but they still don't want to help. Unless it becomes critical and the customers are suffering then they may do something. we run on PII 200mhz machines with 4gb HDD, even upgrading the HDD is an issue as our tech guys supplied 40GB drives and the machines can't support them as CMOS has no further upgrades for these machines.

Therefore killing one HDD a week will wake up the numerous project groups who cant get off their ass and make a decision.
This has been going on for 8 months and My direct management is looking for a fast track way of getting something done.

Magnets sound good though

Good stuff, you've done the right thing, now on to the wrong thing! ;) 200mhz with 4GB HDD! cripes! that is totally totally wrong for anything other than simple browser and OLD versions of office type apps. Get those Magnets going mate, and I wish you good luck!

[Benwah]

Further usergroup trawling has uncovered this gem

"The hard drive,however, is equipped with a steel case which efficiently shields it from external magnetic fields. "

but like most thing in usergroups it's probably unfounded! try the magnets anyway!

[VangaloRR]

Go home and take the fluff out of the cover on your drier, take said fluff to work and pack it into the PSU fan and any cpu fans, hell any fans then leave pc running 24/7 and wait for burnout to occur. Also helps to pack heatsinks with fluff and around any large capaciters.

Drier fluff is recommended as it is generally a gray colour and when its been in the pc for a couple of days it will look like ordinary dust.

Nobody should suspect it if it is done right as old pc's a packed full of dust and the dustier your workplace the more believable a scenario it is. Shed some skin baby.

[hijukal]

1. Start a large disk access (i.e. open, modify and save a large file).

2. Open up the case.

3. Leave the hard disk connected, and pull out the IDE cable. Attach and disconnect a few times.

4. If this doesn't do enough or you're simply bored of playing with the IDE cable, start yanking the MOLEX power connector from the hard disk. Attach and disconnect a few times.

I found that doing this to a hard disk (a while back) stopped it from working reasonably well. The disk stopped booting after a while and eventually failed.

[Maestro]

Download a firmware update for the HDD's you're using, and assuming it takes long enough to update, cut the power to the system while it's updating. It will look a little suspicious if you do that to all the machines, so corrupt a few of them by just pulling the plug during a read/write operation, like hijukal mentioned.

If you're unlucky they might be repairable, but I seriously doubt that the manufacturer would take 6 year old HDD's back for a firmware re-write.

[PooJooce]

brother, cleanse the area with flame.

[Rumpole]

I always found debug to be useful. However, NTFS may defeat it, you could try the following..

1) Whack a floppy in the disk drive
2) run DEBUG from a DOS box
at the debug prompt, type L 100 0 0 c (loads the floppy boot sector/fats etc...)
3) type w 100 2 0 c (writes floppy fats/mbr to the HDD).
4) type q to get out of debug

BE CAREFULL....This stuff can really mess up a system....Don't try it at home.... :-)

As I said, it used to work in DOS and WIN98 but maybe it's been catered for in the latest updates....??

Good Luck!

[pleed]

how bout you complain that your PC keeps rebooting when you are working and you loose data.
They will send it to techs, who will say they don't support them and your will have a replacement machine.

[Fenaughty]

Originally posted by pleed
how bout you complain that your PC keeps rebooting when you are working and you loose data.
They will send it to techs, who will say they don't support them and your will have a replacement machine.

Unfortunatley this wont work as most of our company still runs on these boxes they do support them, currently the rest of the company is in the beginning stages of an upgrade to nice new P4 2.8 boxes, my little department unfortunatley fits outside the square and isn't getting them.

With all the other ideas i should be able to do at least one each on a couple of different machines so they don't all say "Hey how come all your boxes look like dust bunnies" if we use the drier lint option.

Thanks for everyones input its giving me so many options we should have the new gear soon.

[KrisEz]

find some jumpers on the mobo to do with the power in the cpu, and put them on at 90 degrees to what they are at the moment.as for the hard disk, make up a special cable, where IDE chans 1-4 and 36-40 connect to + and -, plug it in, THEN switch it on to avoid nasty burn marks. you pick the voltage, 24V from a SLA should MELT everything, but 12 should still fux it up nicely.

Kris

[Lurgen]

Try a panel-beating hammer, which is basically just a hard rubber mallet. Take the drive out, and beat it carefully a few times. This works best if the drive is running and writing data at the time.

Thank you BOFH for this one...

[VangaloRR]

If you want to keep your job at the end of the day i suggest you dont physically beat the machine, if they even suspect you deliberately made your PC cactus it's the quickest route to the dole queue.

The other option is to retry the management report from a productivity perspective using case studies and real world examples. For instance this report (http://www.necmitsubishi.com/press/PressDetail.cfm?document_id=881) at NEC-Mitsubishi electronics helped me get a dual monitor setup along with my upgrade from a PII 300 to a P4 3G. Your management report shouldn't be "we want new tuff cause our old stuff is crappy", you have to prove to them that new stuff = more $$ not less, they see IT as a huge expense not a way to make money so it's up to you to make them see your point of view.