Five Great Tools To Predict And Prevent Hard Drive Failure

T

The Tech Professor

Guest
Hello everyone,

When I first started out I would begin a repair job without first checking out the condition of the Hard Drive. What a mistake! Now the first thing that I do is take a good look at the state of the HD so that I'm not working away on a failing drive. Here are five great tools that will help you to know what condition the drive is in (before you start repairing). Please let me know other tools that you have found effective:

1) CrystalDiskInfo: CrystalDiskInfo is a HDD health monitoring utility. It displays basic HDD information, monitors S.M.A.R.T. values and disk temperature. I use this tool on every computer that I repair!

2) HD Tune: HD Tune is a hard disk utility with many functions. It can be used to measure the drive’s performance, scan for errors, check the health status (S.M.A.R.T.), securely erase all data and much more. A very valuable tool to have in your tool kit!

3) HDD Health: HDD Health is a full-featured failure-prediction agent for machines using Windows 95, 98, NT, Me, 2000, XP, Vista and Windows 7. Sitting in the system tray, it monitors hard disks and alerts you to impending failure. The program uses Self Monitoring and Reporting Technology (S.M.A.R.T.) built into all new hard disks, and can predict failures on your hard drives. A host of alerting features include email, local pop-up messages, net messages, and event logging, while using no system resources.

4) HDDScan: HDDScan is a freeware utility for hard drive diagnostics (RAID arrays, Flash USB and SSD drives are also supported). The program can test storage device for errors (Bad-blocks and bad sectors), show S.M.A.R.T. attributes and change some HDD parameters such as AAM, APM, etc. HDDScan can be useful for performing the regular “health test” for your drive and predicting its degradation, so you will be able to prevent data loss and backup your files before you will have to contact the data recovery service. Additionally, software can be used as the hard disk temperature monitor and reading/writing benchmark – performance graph is displayed for every test.

5) GSmartControl: I actually first heard about this tool here on Technibble! An awesome hard disk drive health inspection tool! GSmartControl is a graphical user interface smart control tool for querying and controlling SMART (Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology) data on modern hard disk drives. It allows you to inspect the drive’s SMART data to determine its health, as well as run various tests on it.

Best wishes,
The Tech Professor
 
:rolleyes:

Actually I would have thought that after a quick SMART test, the specific disk manufacturer's disk testing application would commonly be the next logical step for suspected hdd issues. But maybe thats just me.
 
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16k_zx81 said:
Actually I would have thought that after a quick smart test, the manufacturer's disk testing tools would be the next logical step. Perhaps I am alone in this?
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I rarely if ever use the manufacture tools unless I absolutely need a second opinion. Gsmartcontrol is the most accurate 3rd party HDD diagnostics tool I have come across thus far and it allows you to test multiple hard drives at once. Out of several thousand hard drives that I have tested, I can maybe think of 2 or 3 times where I actually felt the need to use a manufacture disk. I think all of those where Fujitus hard drives.
 
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I wonder if there really are any techs out there that struggle with finding hard disk testing tools? I suspect not. It's super basic.

Manufacturers tools, Seatools for everything, 3rd party tools - it makes little or no difference as long you understand what they are actually testing.
 
Not keen on them....spent too many years seeing s.m.a.r.t. cry wolf...and drive is fine, and seen it never give alerts..and the drive dies shortly after.

Drives are cheap and disposable....if one is suspect, we'll clone clients drive to a new one..which is cheaper than the time spent benching the rig and running tests on it. Client gets computer back that runs better and has a longer life expectancy.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
Drives are cheap and disposable....if one is suspect, we'll clone clients drive to a new one..which is cheaper than the time spent benching the rig and running tests on it. Client gets computer back that runs better and has a longer life expectancy.
Click to expand...

I totally agree, especially with the type of work you do. If you suspect the drive is failing, replace it.
 
oldtech said:
Randy - dude...what is the point here? You are clearly regurgitating info found in numerous threads and already known by the majority of the TN community. This and previous posts are I suspect simply a way to bump search results for your blog?

http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Randy_Knowles

http://randythetechprofessor.com/
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Honesty, I do not see the problem with someone summarizing or regurgitating information that has already been said on the forum as long as it is helpful. I am sure that if nothing else, noobs will find this information helpful. In any case, I do not see a link back to his site in the post or in his sig.
 
oldtech said:
Randy - dude...what is the point here? You are clearly regurgitating info found in numerous threads and already known by the majority of the TN community. This and previous posts are I suspect simply a way to bump search results for your blog?

http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Randy_Knowles

http://randythetechprofessor.com/
Click to expand...

I thought it was a decent summery of a topic of recent interest given the number of posts on the subject. He didnt link back to his website at all, even if it is a copy and past from his site. I think someone is creeping and holding grudges.
 
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Hello everyone,

Thank you for the comments.

I posted the Hard Drive tool information thinking that it might help someone who had yet to discover these tools (most likely someone just starting out). I'm sure that there are many techs with different experience levels viewing the forums. Hope that the information helped someone.

Best wishes,
The Tech Professor
 
If only I had seen this a couple of weeks ago I would not be as annoyed as I am right now. I have an external drive that I use to store my music on as well as customers data if they brought it to my home. I was fixing a customers laptop and managed to save their data from their laptop onto this drive. a day later when I had finally finished the repair I came to put it all back on their laptop when it failed to recognise my drive. I tried it on 2 or 3 other laptops with the same effect. It turns out it is intermittently seeing the drive and sometimes will show the contents but won't allow me to copy them all over to my computer.

Anyway less of me babbling on. If only I had used my head and tried something like HDD Health I may not be in trouble with this customer.

Just to moan a little more I came to get an RMA from WD and surprise surprise their systems were down for 3 days and then told me they would not offer me any form of data recovery even though the drive is only just over 6 months old.
 
andyroe208 said:
If only I had seen this a couple of weeks ago I would not be as annoyed as I am right now. I have an external drive that I use to store my music on as well as customers data if they brought it to my home. I was fixing a customers laptop and managed to save their data from their laptop onto this drive. a day later when I had finally finished the repair I came to put it all back on their laptop when it failed to recognise my drive. I tried it on 2 or 3 other laptops with the same effect. It turns out it is intermittently seeing the drive and sometimes will show the contents but won't allow me to copy them all over to my computer.

Anyway less of me babbling on. If only I had used my head and tried something like HDD Health I may not be in trouble with this customer.

Just to moan a little more I came to get an RMA from WD and surprise surprise their systems were down for 3 days and then told me they would not offer me any form of data recovery even though the drive is only just over 6 months old.
Click to expand...

I never mix my personal data with customer data on storage devices. I have a ext hd exclusively for client data.

Your problem sounds like a controller issue. If you care more about the data than you do the drive. You can probably crack open the case take the drive out and pop it in a sata toaster and get the data back.

Also I have been stockpiling 32gb flash drives when I can get them cheap for grabbing and storing client data. I know flash is far from bullet proof but I trust it far more than I do spinning disks.

Also no data recovery is standard in the hd industry.
 
colonydata said:
Also I have been stockpiling 32gb flash drives when I can get them cheap for grabbing and storing client data. I know flash is far from bullet proof but I trust it far more than I do spinning disks.
Click to expand...

What?

I would trust a 10 year old drive with 100 bad sectors before a flash drive.. I've never had a hdd zap and all data unrecoverable.. probably had a dozen flash drives do that..

Flash drives are for replaceable data and transferring data where the data stays on one computer til it makes it to the other.
 
compnet said:
What?

I would trust a 10 year old drive with 100 bad sectors before a flash drive.. I've never had a hdd zap and all data unrecoverable.. probably had a dozen flash drives do that..

Flash drives are for replaceable data and transferring data where the data stays on one computer til it makes it to the other.
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well i am the exact opposite.

i've never lost data due to a bad flash drive. lost plenty due to bad hard drives, or a 4-5 foot fall to a concrete floor.
 
Personally I think the thread is a total waste of time and space.

Dont get me wrong, Im all in favour of people posting new, interesting finds that will appeal to the community. Its one of the things that makes TN a nice place to spend time.

I just dont see the point in reiterating information that already is common knowledge, which is abundantly available here and elsewhere.

And yes there is a history here of this guy linking to his own blog and also posting information of an 'educational' nature that was just bad advice.

Maybe its just the Nick and a picture of someone "teaching" along with a history of questionable technical expertise that just irks the hell out of me.

Glad I got that off my chest. I feel better now....

As you were, Randy, Im sure my opinion wont make any difference to you making these posts. Nor should it! :p

.
 
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colonydata said:
I never mix my personal data with customer data on storage devices. I have a ext hd exclusively for client data.

Your problem sounds like a controller issue. If you care more about the data than you do the drive. You can probably crack open the case take the drive out and pop it in a sata toaster and get the data back.

Also I have been stockpiling 32gb flash drives when I can get them cheap for grabbing and storing client data. I know flash is far from bullet proof but I trust it far more than I do spinning disks.

Also no data recovery is standard in the hd industry.
Click to expand...

You are right it was a very bad judgment call on my half, the thing was it was for a friend of a friend so they wanted it doing like yesterday so I took it home to make sure it got done as quick as possible.

I don't believe for 1 second the data is corrupt and the customer has said it's ok but in my eyes it's not, they asked me to save their data so I should do. The thing is do I risk voiding my warranty to get the data myself (I don't think so) or do I pay for data recovery that is well within the warranty period on a failed drive (better option but not right/fair if under warranty)

I would have agreed with flash drives however recently I have had more flash drives fail on me than actual hard drives.

I guess all in all I was silly in all I did, I have learnt my lesson and will probably not do it again
 
16k_zx81 said:
Personally I think the thread is a total waste of time and space.

Dont get me wrong, Im all in favour of people posting new, interesting finds that will appeal to the community. Its one of the things that makes TN a nice place to spend time.

I just dont see the point in reiterating information that already is common knowledge, which is abundantly available here and elsewhere.

And yes there is a history here of this guy linking to his own blog and also posting information of an 'educational' nature that was just bad advice.

Maybe its just the Nick and a picture of someone "teaching" along with a history of questionable technical expertise that just irks the hell out of me.
Click to expand...

the Nick?

Anyway, 100% agreed.

To take it a step further, I see no one has pointed out the "And Prevent" part of the thread subject. There is NO prevention of HDD failure except unplugging the thing. No software will do that for you and even hinting to that point is dishonest at best, or just plain nonsense.

One more step further, I didn't see the "free" part of the post so Spinrite is at least worth a mention.
 
16k_zx81 said:
Nick = Nickname

.............................
Click to expand...

When I saw the nickname of the poster who started the thread, all I could think of was the Shark Tank episode where they had that lady who called herself "The Shoe Professa." No disrespect intended, but that is what popped into my head. Do a google search for it. You can find the video on YouTube.
 
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