EBIOS read error: Device Timeout

[Adrian B]

After recently getting the same problem I tried unplugging all the drives one by one and it turns out to be my old G5 system drive - a 251GB Maxtor SATA - that I have just installled to be my OSX backup - OSX BU.
I so far set one ccc backup to it but having noticed the problem I reformatted it in drive utility hoping to fix the problem.
However on reboot the problem returns?
Any ideas how to solve this?
maybe move the sata cable?
reformat to another file system?
Thanks for any advice!

Replace the drive - it must be about 8 years old now. It is certainly past its expected life of 5 years rather well. As a backup drive you cannot rely on it. Buy a new drive.


Adrian B

 

[totenkopf4]

Replace the drive - it must be about 8 years old now. It is certainly past its expected life of 5 years rather well. As a backup drive you cannot rely on it. Buy a new drive.


Adrian B

Northwinds

See if you can find out the specs on the Hard Drive - it maybe a SATA 1 drive and not a SATA 2 unit.

Also as motors get older they need more time to speed up this could be the reason for the EBIOS error -

See if you can find in the BIOS where you can set some delay time to pause the BIOS from accessing the HD at boot ( Delay Time)

 

[thomahawk]

Strange. I also see this error. My system boots finde, except that the startup needs about 1-2 minutes until Chimera comes up and loads OSX within some seconds.

During the long boot (black screen) I see "Bios read error, device timeout" but it goes on and loads into chimera.

I thought maybe it is looking fro systems on other drives, but I already did set BIOS to boot 1. from my SSD (the boot drive can be choosen exactly in that BIOS setting) and in the other setting for device order I set 1. HDD, 2. CD 3. USB – suposing it takes 1. finds the SSD and goes right into loading system. Or does it go thru all 1 - 2 - 3 first?

 

[totenkopf4]

Anyone got any ideas on this please?

northwinds


Yes I have several .....

But you need to list the hardware otherwise we are just whistling in the dark.

The General Rule of thumb for EBIOS read errors is something in the SATA Drive chain (DVD or HD) is not ready or not their or is in an error condition.

 

[loosedrag]

If you have a DVD/CD-RW, try disconnecting it. Or remove it from the device boot list in BIOS.

FWIW, this same thing happened to me. When I read this post, I remembered I'd been using my DVD drive for data transfer (!) so I jiggled the cables and gave it the stinkeye, and voila! My hack found my mac and I'm gold. Thanks!