Running the Dell Diagnostics 7-13
If the response when you press a mouse button is different from the usual or
anticipated response, the button contact may be damaged.
A mouse button does not work at all.
The cursor does not respond on the screen in accordance with the movements
you make with the mouse.
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The Diskette Drives Test Group tests both 5.25-inch and 3.5-inch diskette drives. The
tests are listed in Table 7-7.
A diskette drive problem can appear to be a diskette problem because defective dis-
kettes produce faulty-drive error messages. Dell recommends running the Diskette
Drives Test Group more than once using diskettes from different sources.
The following symptoms usually suggest a drive problem and w arran t running a test in
the Diskette Drives Test Group:
An error message appears on the screen stating that the computer cannot

read

from or

write

to a diskette.
A diskette cannot be properly formatted , or fo rmat er ror me ssag es appear o n the
screen.
Data on diskettes is corrupted or lost; these problems may be intermittent.
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The IDE (ATA/A TAPI) Devices Test Group c he c ks the functional ity of up to four de vice s
(two on each channel) of any capacity as well as the hard-disk drive controller.
Table7-8 lists the tests.
If you check a hard-disk drive to determine the amount of av ailable sp ace, y our operat-
ing system will probably report problem areas. Most hard-disk drives have a small
amount of space that is not usable. Identifi cation of unusable disk space, unless it is
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Change Line Checks for bent pins on the diskette drive controller and for
defective lines on the diskette cable.
Seek Checks the drive’s ability to search for a specified track on the
diskette and to position its read/write heads to all tracks.
Read Positions the read/write heads at each cylinder of the diskette
for reading data and verifies that all tracks on the disket te ca n be
read correctly.
Write Positions the read/write heads at each cylinder of the diskette
and verifies that all tracks on the diskette can be written to
correctly.