PDA

View Full Version : Running a hard drive test to check for incoming failure



FoxTrot
01-01-2012, 10:12 AM
A friend of mines HP laptop gets this black screen with this error everytime he boots up, hes been having it for the past couple months.

"Smart hard drive detects imminent failure"

Looked online and says to run hard drive quick test through the diagnostics by hitting F10 at boot followed by a full test. Ran both and both said "test passed" but then followed by Smart hard drive detects imminent failure again.

Im going to check later this morning to see if his computers bios is up to date and also run a disk error test in windows to fix all his disk errors and bad sectors.

Ill also check what brand his drive is and run the manufacturers drive test on their site through their software.

Other than that, if that test passes too, is that good enough tessting to confirm that the drive is not dying?

Or is there any other suggestions you have to test a hard drives condition?

Read online that the error can occur from an outdated bios or the laptop getting shock from perhaps contact when the laptop moving. He travels with it all the time, so that does make sense if this is the case.

colsankey
01-01-2012, 10:39 AM
Agreed: Check the make/model of the drive and run a full scan from the manufacturer's site. But if it says imminent failure, treat it as such.

I'd assume anything important is backed up already, if not, make it happen. There's nothing quite like losing data you care about, except losing data on a drive you've been warned about.

Diffrent people have differing personal opinions, but drives are still relatively cheap. They've gone up in price with the floods, but the drive manages all your data and OS, if it's still warning you after a full scan, I'd personally chuck the drive and reinstall on a new one for peace of mind.

Seth1968
01-01-2012, 10:46 AM
^This.

SMART isn't nearly as reliable as the HD manufacturers test.

Just keep the data backed up.

Seth1968
01-01-2012, 12:38 PM
Forgot to add:

If the data isn't backed up, do so first as the diagnostic procedure and/or full sector chkdsk might bring the drive over the edge.

95teetee
01-01-2012, 12:41 PM
^great tip- I've had that happen myself.

Seth1968
01-01-2012, 01:10 PM
Me too.

I had the drive slaved and had access to the files. I ran a chkdsk /r on it, which resulted in the drive's file system showing as raw. I had to run a recovery program which was a real PITA compared to just backing up some folders when I had the chance.