Re: Sticky platters
"Yes, stiction was a serious problem back then. Disks without load/unload ramps had to rest their heads on platters, so any types of percussion had to be administered very carefully."
When was 'back then'? I parked my hard drive heads back in the 80s before turning off the PC. There was a distinct clunk and then it was appropriate to reach the power flip switch - located handiy behind the PC.
Or are we talking about different things here?
I've also succesfully used the rubber mallet technique with hard drives that refused to spin up. Obviously you needed to hit the side - sometimes rather hard too.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
