"Device attached to system not functioning"

[DJpailo]

Can anyone advise me to what this means. I get this message under something called "S.M.A.R.T" for my hard drive?

[DennisD]

I haven't got an answer for you, but while looking for something I found this really amusing rant by a guy with the same error message, and it's a good read.

 

http://usrlocal.com/2009/08/a-device-attached-to-the-system-is-not-functioning/

 

I don't think it will help you, but then again ...

[DJpailo]

Hmm, my username is just Paul, so it can't be that Is it possible my hard drive doesn't support this SMART feature?

[DennisD]

Have you tried all the usual suspects?

 

Anything in the event viewer at about the time it started, or any "yellow flagged" entries in Device Manager?

 

As the guy in that link says, the error message is about as unhelpful as it could be.

 

Were there any more details popping up with that error?

[Tasgandy]

Can anyone advise me to what this means. I get this message under something called "S.M.A.R.T" for my hard drive?

Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology, or S.M.A.R.T. (sometimes written as SMART), is a monitoring system for computer hard disks to detect and report on various indicators of reliability, in the hope of anticipating failures.

 

When a failure is anticipated by S.M.A.R.T., the drive is typically replaced and returned to the manufacturer, who uses these dead drives to discover where faults lie and how to prevent them from recurring on the next generation of hard disk drives.