Confirm my suspicions....HDD about to die?

Paul. W

Paul. W

Paul. W

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29 Dec 2009
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522
Currently using a 74gb WD Raptor drive as my OS HDD. Ive had it for years now, and had a wonderful hassle-free life with it.

However over the last three days its started to act rather strangely. Windows has now started to randomly freeze for 5-7 second intervals, with no application being to blame.

CHKDSK has been kicking in everytime ive switched the machine on each day. On day one it found 3 bad sectors. Day 2 it found 5 bad sectors. Yesterday it found 8 :(

I can only assume that this drive is nearing the end of its life?
 
Can't remember if the free demo of HDTune has diagnostics, worth downloading to see. It can read the SMART chip on the drive, pretty much instant diagnosis. Also has checking utilities bit if it shows damaged sectors in the "Health" section, it's scrap.

HDTune is a great app, I bought it to use at work, has been invaluable with the amount of time it's saved
 
d_brennen said:
Can't remember if the free demo of HDTune has diagnostics, worth downloading to see. It can read the SMART chip on the drive, pretty much instant diagnosis. Also has checking utilities bit if it shows damaged sectors in the "Health" section, it's scrap.
Click to expand...

You know I haven't run any diagnostic tool in over a year. Should point out that with 4 damaged sectors, it's still only listed as warning (yellow), you have to click on the ID to actually get that info. This would however explain the odd errors I've been having =D

New drive time :(

Edit: Lifeguard give a smart pass after the quick test, but hdtune reports errors without testing. Which do we believe?
 
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Im going to see what happens when I boot the machine up when I get home from work later. If it finds anymore then I may have to go down the new HDD route too.

However it does give me an excuse to buy an SSD :D

Wont be able to afford a big one though.....looking at them, the cheapest 40gb sandforce based SSD will be what I can have.
 
If space isn't an issue then that would be fine, but you could raid a pair of 320GB f4s for that money too, although the ssds instant access would trump them in any os.

Just going to grab a 1tb f3 personally, but the last time I had chkdsk running at boot ups I had a faulty stick of ram. Sounds like your hd is dying but ram only takes 15 min to check:)
 
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Azuse05 said:
Edit: Lifeguard give a smart pass after the quick test, but hdtune reports errors without testing. Which do we believe?
Click to expand...

You need to use a full disk check to really see if there are bad sectors on the disk. If there are any, change the disk right away as it will only just get worse.
 
Problem found. It was actually my programs and games drive which was goosed.

I have an OS drive, a second drive for programs and games, and a third drive for storage.

My second one wouldnt even run the basic WD tools test. Tried to copy my steam folder off it but no luck, failed after the first 50mb :(

Whats the fastest mechanical HDD out at the mo which is 300gb plus?
 
Sweet, cheers guys :)

Been having a think......my 1st gen raptor used for OS could do with being replaced anyways soon so....

I was thinking of getting two Samsung F4 drives and making them RAID 0 to use them as my programs / games drive. Ill keep with the Raptor until next month when ill pick up an SSD to replace it.

Couple of questions as ive never played with RAID before. Can I buy two sammys, throw them in, make a RAID0 array, and still be able to boot off my raptor drive with no issues at all?

I want my drive config to look like this if possible:

C: = WD Raptor (to be replaced with SSD shortly)
D: = 2 x samsung F4's in RAID 0
E: = 1tb storage drive

Last thing, what best stripe size should I use for an array consisting of lots of games, office etc?
 
Yes you can, very similar setup to mine.

C/ 120 GB OCZ OS drive
D/ 320 X 2 GB F4 Raid 0
E/ Other

Currently getting 290meg/sec, read/write's with Atto
 
I'm looking at getting a SSD for my OS drive as well but at the moment i'm not sure if its worth me getting a SSD now or wait for next tech ones along with trying for a 240gig :P then atleast i get OS and most of my fav games on it lol
 
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