Failing drive.

[lukesterboy]

So litterally 3 days ago, maybe not even that I made a post because I saw that in crystal disk info on one of my drives 1tb Seagate drive with around 24k hours said caution. It only had one error that was "reallocated sectors". Now after ordering a new 3tb drive and copy all my data too it my 2tb drive which I temporarily copied the 1tb data too is now saying its failing with the word caution and 3 errors. One of which being the " reallocated sectors". So my question Is should I believe/relay on crystal disk info. If so what does this mean, is my drive on the edge of failing, prone to data loss or unsafe to use? Can it be fixed with reformatting or anything? 

 

Also is it just coincidence that my 2tb is now failing or could it be because its had nearly 1tb of data copied on to and off it in the past 2 days? I just spent 90 on my new drive and really can't afford to replace this 2tb. Its only about a year old.

[Guest]

You had a 1 tb drive, and a 2 tb drive. You backed up the 1 tb drive to the 2 tb drive. So you have a max of 2 tb of storage space in use. (otherwise you can't back-up all your data to your 2 tb drive...)

 

You just bought an EXTRA 3 tb drive.

 

You can back-up the 2 tb drive to the 3 tb drive, and still have at least 1 tb of free space. That would go a while, I think.

 

My advice: use it till it breaks. Use the 2 tb drive, and keep backing up the important data to your 3 tb drive. Keep using the 2 tb drive, till it fails. Only then start using the 3 tb drive regulary.

 

Also, how old is your 2 tb drive? My (consumer grade) drives will last at least 5 years with 24/7 usage/computer on.

 

Also try to use "HD tune". This is the software I always use to test my HDD's. Easy to read and understand.

[lukesterboy]

5 minutes ago, Dutch-stoner said:

You had a 1 tb drive, and a 2 tb drive. You backed up the 1 tb drive to the 2 tb drive. So you have a max of 2 tb of storage space in use. (otherwise you can't back-up all your data to your 2 tb drive...)

 

You just bought an EXTRA 3 tb drive.

 

You can back-up the 2 tb drive to the 3 tb drive, and still have at least 1 tb of free space. That would go a while, I think.

 

My advice: use it till it breaks. Use the 2 tb drive, and keep backing up the important data to your 3 tb drive. Keep using the 2 tb drive, till it fails. Only then start using the 3 tb drive regulary.

 

Also, how old is your 2 tb drive? My (consumer grade) drives will last at least 5 years with 24/7 usage/computer on.

 

Also try to use "HD tune". This is the software I always use to test my HDD's. Easy to read and understand.

Correct. Fair enough. And yeh important files I'll try to backup then. Is it really failing to some extent though or is crystal disk info lying. If it isn't. Like wow what are the chances. My 2tb drive is around 8 months old... And I usually keep my PC on 24/7. HD tune for telling if a HDD is failing?

[Guest]

HDD tune has some nice tests, with a graph. You can just really see the performance. (you want smooth lines in the graph) Don't know much about Crystal Disk Info however... Not used it jet.

 

My 2 tb drive is liek 3,5 years old or so. Just checked HD tune. It had 1 spin up failure. (it's listed as a warning) But I am not worried at all. Just finished some other tests, and the graphs look really nice, and no other erros for me.

 

And it's a quality brand HDD, 8 months of 24/7 usage in a consumer enivroment, should not have wrecked your HDD. (unless your HDD is acting like it's on a server setup, reading and writing data 24/7...)

 

I should not worry TO much about the 2 tb drive failing. Just keep backing up your important files, and just wait like 3-4 years, till it really might die.

 

Also, in my experiance... When a HDD really starts to fail, it will usually make more sounds. You should still have some time to do a full or important back-up.

[lukesterboy]

8 hours ago, Dutch-stoner said:

HDD tune has some nice tests, with a graph. You can just really see the performance. (you want smooth lines in the graph) Don't know much about Crystal Disk Info however... Not used it jet.

 

My 2 tb drive is liek 3,5 years old or so. Just checked HD tune. It had 1 spin up failure. (it's listed as a warning) But I am not worried at all. Just finished some other tests, and the graphs look really nice, and no other erros for me.

 

And it's a quality brand HDD, 8 months of 24/7 usage in a consumer enivroment, should not have wrecked your HDD. (unless your HDD is acting like it's on a server setup, reading and writing data 24/7...)

 

I should not worry TO much about the 2 tb drive failing. Just keep backing up your important files, and just wait like 3-4 years, till it really might die.

 

Also, in my experiance... When a HDD really starts to fail, it will usually make more sounds. You should still have some time to do a full or important back-up.

Ah OK. Then maybe that means my 1tb hard drive which I thought was failing was actually still alight to use. I never heard any bad noises from it, yet.

[scottyseng]

16 minutes ago, lukesterboy said:

Ah OK. Then maybe that means my 1tb hard drive which I thought was failing was actually still alight to use. I never heard any bad noises from it, yet.

Yeah, you should start worrying when the sectors begin increasing by 3-4 every hour or less. I remember on my failing WD Black Drive (28k hours, 5 years), you could hear a very noticeable click click click noise every 10 min, and crystal disk mark would increase by 3-4, exceeding over 300 before I stopped keeping it in the PC just for the lolz to see how long it would stay alive.

[realReXishere]

1 hour ago, scottyseng said:

Yeah, you should start worrying when the sectors begin increasing by 3-4 every hour or less. I remember on my failing WD Black Drive (28k hours, 5 years), you could hear a very noticeable click click click noise every 10 min, and crystal disk mark would increase by 3-4, exceeding over 300 before I stopped keeping it in the PC just for the lolz to see how long it would stay alive.

After how long it died?

[scottyseng]

3 minutes ago, Gautam.Dey said:

After how long it died?

Well, technically, it still works, but has over 340 failed sectors / will fail the WD Lifeguard Diagnostics test. I unplugged it because the constant clicking was getting annoying. I wouldn't trust it with data obviously.

 

I think from the first clicking noise, it went downhill pretty fast after two months. At the start, it wasn't too bad, just one sector every week. At the last week though, it was clicking off a sector every 10-15 min.

[Captain_WD]

11 hours ago, lukesterboy said:

~snip~

Hi there

 

Could you post a screenshot of the S.M.A.R.T. status of the drive? 

 

My suggestion would be to back everything to the new drive, fill the 2TB drive with zeros a few times and then observe the S.M.A.R.T. status if any of hte values continue to rise. You may have some software errors that were transferred from the old drive. 

 

Don't exclude the probability of this drive failing too. 

 

Captain_WD. 

[lukesterboy]

8 hours ago, scottyseng said:

Yeah, you should start worrying when the sectors begin increasing by 3-4 every hour or less. I remember on my failing WD Black Drive (28k hours, 5 years), you could hear a very noticeable click click click noise every 10 min, and crystal disk mark would increase by 3-4, exceeding over 300 before I stopped keeping it in the PC just for the lolz to see how long it would stay alive.

 

Ah ok. Currently it's on 8 reallocated sectors. I assume you mean "reallocated sectors" when you say "sectors".

7 hours ago, scottyseng said:

Well, technically, it still works, but has over 340 failed sectors / will fail the WD Lifeguard Diagnostics test. I unplugged it because the constant clicking was getting annoying. I wouldn't trust it with data obviously.

 

I think from the first clicking noise, it went downhill pretty fast after two months. At the start, it wasn't too bad, just one sector every week. At the last week though, it was clicking off a sector every 10-15 min.

2

Oh ok. Does it still have it's full storage capacity?

7 hours ago, Captain_WD said:

Hi there

 

Could you post a screenshot of the S.M.A.R.T. status of the drive? 

 

My suggestion would be to back everything to the new drive, fill the 2TB drive with zeros a few times and then observe the S.M.A.R.T. status if any of hte values continue to rise. You may have some software errors that were transferred from the old drive. 

 

Don't exclude the probability of this drive failing too. 

 

Captain_WD. 

1

Smart status from inside crystal disk, if so see the attached picture below.

 

So copy everything from my 2tb to my new 3tb drive? I don't want to break that one too if it is a software issue that is causing it. Any other way? Can it break my new drive even by copy software where errors from the 1tb -> 2tb -> 3tb?? 

 

When you say don't exclude you mean it could actually be failing?

[scottyseng]

3 hours ago, lukesterboy said:

 

Yes, the reallocated sectors. On my WD drive though, the uncorrectable sectors and pending sector count were rising. The reallocated sector remained the same. All three you should be weary of. On my drive, I'd say the first bit of the drive was fine, but as soon as the drive attempted to cross the damaged section, it could click off and you could see it had more sectors it needed to reallocate, but it couldn't because it couldn't make it across to the rest of the drive and kept damaging more of the platter as it attempted to.

 

Yes, the drive still shows as a full 2TB WD Black drive, but it probably will destroy itself eventually if kept on. You can run the long generic test from Seagate. If it passes, you're good, if it fails, move the data over. Drives have backup sectors where they can move data to when current ones go bad. That's what happens when it reallocates sectors, but usually there's a reason (a bad one) for that happening.

 

Not going to lie though, this drive is really new, only 5k hours? That's quite fast to get "caution" for a new drive. Did you test the drive when you first got it? I usually run the extended test (WD Lifeguard) or Long Generic (Seatools for Seagate) on any new drive I get in to make sure the drive isn't DOA or part scratched (happened when I bought a drive from newegg once before they had hard drive pillows. My six year old 1 TB drive appeared to work fine, but when you ran the test, several sectors were damaged...I wish I had known back then when I first bought the drive...but I went five years without noticing because I never used the drive to anywhere near full. It wasn't until I had filled the drive up halfway that it started killing itself.

 

Definitely keep a eye on it, if it keeps increasing, you will have to RMA the 2TB drive (It should be in warranty right? It's still quite young for that kind of power count / hours).

 

This was my 2TB drive back then:

[lukesterboy]

5 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

Yes, the reallocated sectors. On my WD drive though, the uncorrectable sectors and pending sector count were rising. The reallocated sector remained the same. All three you should be weary of. On my drive, I'd say the first bit of the drive was fine, but as soon as the drive attempted to cross the damaged section, it could click off and you could see it had more sectors it needed to reallocate, but it couldn't because it couldn't make it across to the rest of the drive and kept damaging more of the platter as it attempted to.

 

Yes, the drive still shows as a full 2TB WD Black drive, but it probably will destroy itself eventually if kept on. You can run the long generic test from Seagate. If it passes, you're good, if it fails, move the data over. Drives have backup sectors where they can move data to when current ones go bad. That's what happens when it reallocates sectors, but usually there's a reason (a bad one) for that happening.

 

Not going to lie though, this drive is really new, only 5k hours? That's quite fast for a new drive. Did you test the drive when you first got it? I usually run the extended test (WD Lifeguard) or Long Generic (Seatools for Seagate) on any new drive I get in to make sure the drive isn't DOA or part scratched (happened when I bought a drive from newegg once before they had hard drive pillows. My super old 1 TB drive appeared to work fine, but when you ran the test, several sectors were damaged...I wish I had known back then when I first bought the drive...but I went five years without noticing because I never used the drive to anywhere near full. It wasn't until I had filled the drive up halfway that it started killing itself.

 

Definitely keep a eye on it, if it keeps increasing, you will have to RMA the 2TB drive (It should be in warranty right? It's still quite young for that kind of power count / hours).

 

 

Yeh, the drive is fairly new. I didn't test the drive when I first got it no. Could you link me to the WD and Seagate tools, thanks? I think it should have warranty still. I hope, I'll have to check. I did get I from amazon, though...

[scottyseng]

6 minutes ago, lukesterboy said:

Yeh, the drive is fairly new. I didn't test the drive when I first got it no. Could you link me to the WD and Seagate tools, thanks? I think it should have warranty still. I hope, I'll have to check. I did get I from amazon, though...

hmm, weird, I've gotten drives from amazon in the cardboard box with the two plastic thingies on the side before without issue. Yeah, depending on the mood of the shipping guy, your drive may or may not survive the trip. I had a 3TB Red arrive DOA from newegg because the nox literally was abused so bad that the drive managed to make it out of the box it was in, and out of the plastic ends, and was sitting on the bottom of the box when I got it. I was like man, if the drive survived that, I'd be freaking amazed. But now Newegg uses these plastic drive airbags that work really well now.

 

WD Lifeguard (You should see Data Lifeguard Diagnostics in this list):

http://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?lang=en

 

Seagate Seatools (Seatools for Windows is what you want):

http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/seatools/

 

And WinDFT for HGST drives (If you ever buy any):

https://www.hgst.com/support/hard-drive-support/downloads

 

Ah, do note, these long / extended tests scan the drive end to end, and take a lot of time to run, getting worse with how large the drive is. I think 4TB is around 14 hours for me, 1TB was 6 hours, and 2TB was 10 hours.

[lukesterboy]

6 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

hmm, weird, I've gotten drives from amazon in the cardboard box with the two plastic thingies on the side before without issue. Yeah, depending on the mood of the shipping guy, your drive may or may not survive the trip. I had a 3TB Red arrive DOA from newegg because the nox literally was abused so bad that the drive managed to make it out of the box it was in, and out of the plastic ends, and was sitting on the bottom of the box when I got it. I was like man, if the drive survived that, I'd be freaking amazed. But now Newegg uses these plastic drive airbags that work really well now.

 

WD Lifeguard (You should see Data Lifeguard Diagnostics in this list):

http://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?lang=en

 

Seagate Seatools (Seatools for Windows is what you want):

http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/seatools/

 

And WinDFT for HGST drives (If you ever buy any):

https://www.hgst.com/support/hard-drive-support/downloads

 

 

Ok cheers mate. Thanks for being such a great help. I'll install these programs and get back to you in a sec. Also i check amazon for the warranty. My new drive is the 3TB WD. I've already put data on it but what tests should i run?

 

EDIT: Just checked amazon. Think I'm out of luck. It's just over a year old now.

[scottyseng]

9 minutes ago, lukesterboy said:

Ok cheers mate. Thanks for being such a great help. I'll install these programs and get back to you in a sec. Also i check amazon for the warranty. My new drive is the 3TB WD. I've already put data on it but what tests should i run?

The Extended test on WD Lifeguard diagnostics. It'll take a long time just fyi because it does scan the drive end to end. It only checks for hardware (drive) errors) so if you any corrupted data from software errors, this software does not know that. It only checks the drive for damage.

 

You can also install crystal disk mark just to get a ballpark idea of speeds to make sure you have nothing crazy out of expected speeds. I usually run 9 passes at 4GiB. You should easily exceed 130ish MB/s for sequential stuff.

 

Yeah, you should have both a WD (or Seagate) warranty and amazon warranty. I'd probably use Amazon first just because they're faster, but yeah, both work. Pretty sure your Segate has at least a three year warranty.

 

Ah, be careful on Amazon though, some sellers will sell dirt cheap OEM or bulk drives that do not have a factory warranty. These drives are meant for enterprise / OEM builders where you provide your own warranty (Hence why they're cheap). On amazon, they do look like retail drives, and yes, I got burned by this, but kept the drives anyway and decided to just buy a spare one if something goes wrong. They usually also say stuff like "Seller provided warranty" but you honestly have no idea if that seller will even be around long enough for their "warranty". If you were unable to register the drive for Seagate's warranty, you bought a OEM drive.

 

Oh, not sure if you saw, but I did add my old WD 2TB Crystal Disk Info above in my second post (Sorry, I edit my posts too much).

[lukesterboy]

5 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

The Extended test on WD Lifeguard diagnostics. It'll take a long time just fyi because it does scan the drive end to end. It only checks for hardware (drive) errors) so if you any corrupted data from software errors, this software does not know that. It only checks the drive for damage.

 

You can also install crystal disk mark just to get a ballpark idea of speeds to make sure you have nothing crazy out of expected speeds. I usually run 9 passes at 4GiB. You should easily exceed 130ish MB/s for sequential stuff.

 

Yeah, you should have both a WD warranty and amazon warranty. I'd probably use Amazon first just because they're faster, but yeah, both work.

 

Oh, not sure if you saw, but I did add my old WD 2TB Crystal Disk Info above in my second post (Sorry, I edit my posts too much).

 

 

 

Ah ok. So if I do have software errors it's not going to flag anything up right? 

 

Ok, i'll do that too.

 

The WD drive is my brand new drive that I got like 2 days ago. (3tb and NOT the failing drive)

 

My Seagate 2tb drive is the failing one. It was purchased in September 2015 as you can see in the above amazon picture so I don't know whether Seagate has over 1-year warranty?

 

Ah ok. I had a look. To be honest none of this stuff means much to me. I know what a sector is but I don't know what any of this "reallocated sector" and stuff means.

 

Just run seatools on my failing seagate 2tb and drive and got this message...Is it worth doing this DOS business its talking about?

[scottyseng]

Just now, lukesterboy said:

-snip

Yeah, sadly, you'd have to run a disk check on windows on the drives to find file errors. It's actually pretty good at fixing data by itself.

 

I'd test all of the drives at this point to be honest (Even the new one), rather be safe than sorry.

 

http://www.seagate.com/internal-hard-drives/barracuda/

 

According to Seagate, drive has a two year warranty. I just hope

 

Ah, I did edit by post from before in the middle to talk about how on Amazon, if there's a drive with a price "too good to be true", it's probably a OEM drive without warranty.

[lukesterboy]

7 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

Yeah, sadly, you'd have to run a disk check on windows on the drives to find file errors. It's actually pretty good at fixing data by itself.

 

I'd test all of the drives at this point to be honest (Even the new one), rather be safe than sorry.

 

http://www.seagate.com/internal-hard-drives/barracuda/

 

According to Seagate, drive has a two year warranty. I just hope

 

Ah, I did edit by post from before in the middle to talk about how on Amazon, if there's a drive with a price "too good to be true", it's probably a OEM drive without warranty.

 

Ok. Might need some info on how to do that. What will these software errors cause? Can they cause dead drives or what happened to my 1tb drive it has now caused to my 2tb drive?

 

Yeh, I will do this overnight. Is testing both drives at night ok? Or one at a time? How bandwidth intense are they?

 

Ok, good I guess??

 

Are you saying that drive is a too good to be true price and that maybe I got no warranty?

[scottyseng]

1 minute ago, lukesterboy said:

-snip-

Ah, no, if you copy data from a drive that had errors or was failing, there is a chance that even though you copied the data from the old drive to the new one, there's a slight chance that the old drive had corrupted your data and it may need to be corrected. Moving data from old drive to new drive does make the new drive fail from software / data errors.

 

Yeah, I test four drives at the same time. Overnight is fine. It pretty much puts the drives under full load, so you shouldn't use them while the test is going.

 

Oh, it's just my warning to you if you buy from third party (Not amazon verified) sellers. It's very easy to accidently buy one of these OEM drives.

 

Do register your drive for warranty with Seagate though, if you do get accepted, you can send your 2TB drive in and they'll send you a fixed one.

[lukesterboy]

1 minute ago, scottyseng said:

Ah, no, if you copy data from a drive that had errors or was failing, there is a chance that even though you copied the data from the old drive to the new one, there's a slight chance that the old drive had corrupted your data and it may need to be corrected. Moving data from old drive to new drive does make the new drive fail from software / data errors.

 

Yeah, I test four drives at the same time. Overnight is fine. It pretty much puts the drives under full load, so you shouldn't use them while the test is going.

 

Oh, it's just my warning to you if you buy from third party (Not amazon verified) sellers. It's very easy to accidently buy one of these OEM drives.

 

Do register your drive for warranty with Seagate though, if you do get accepted, you can send your 2TB drive in and they'll send you a fixed one.

 

Ok. So it only causes the software / data errors then. Not failing/dead drives.

 

Ok. I'll do that tonight then. So the Long Genric test on the Seagate drive and extended test on the WD drive, correct??

 

Oh ok. That drive looked like it was from a marketplace seller is it possible I got an OEM drive then? What is OEM drive mean, used, no warranty??

 

Ah cool. They send me my one fixed or a brand new one or one with around the same usage?

[scottyseng]

1 minute ago, lukesterboy said:

Ok. So it only causes the software / data errors then. Not failing/dead drives.

 

Ok. I'll do that tonight then. So the Long Genric test on the Seagate drive and extended test on the WD drive, correct??

 

Oh ok. That drive looked like it was from a marketplace seller is it possible I got an OEM drive then? What is OEM drive mean, used, no warranty??

 

Ah cool. They send me my one fixed or a brand new one or one with around the same usage?

Yeah, no failing dead drives. That's hardware issue only.

 

Yeah, correct.

 

It is possible, but you should see the seller listing the drive as having "seller warranty". You can tell right away if you can't register your drive for warranty on Seagate's site.

OEM is a new drive, but no warranty. If you seen prebuilt computers at the store, from like Dell, HP or whatever, they use OEM drives because they provide the warranty themselves and would rather pay less to not have the drive's retail (2+ year warranty) so they can make more profit from you.

 

In enterprise, OEM drives are good for buying a lot because the drives are usually in large RAID arrays where if one drive dies, they can swap in a spare OEM drive. Because of the cheaper cost of the drives, it's very easy to afford an extra spare drive or two.

 

It'll be a recertified / refurbished but new drive.

[lukesterboy]

4 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

Yeah, no failing dead drives. That's hardware issue only.

 

Yeah, correct.

 

It is possible, but you should see the seller listing the drive as having "seller warranty". You can tell right away if you can't register your drive for warranty on Seagate's site.

OEM is a new drive, but no warranty. If you seen prebuilt computers at the store, from like Dell, HP or whatever, they use OEM drives because they provide the warranty themselves and would rather pay less to not have the drive's retail (2+ year warranty) so they can make more profit from you.

 

In enterprise, OEM drives are good for buying a lot because the drives are usually in large RAID arrays where if one drive dies, they can swap in a spare OEM drive. Because of the cheaper cost of the drives, it's very easy to afford an extra spare drive or two.

 

It'll be a recertified / refurbished but new drive.

 

Ok, well as you can see below I ran a check disk and no problems found on the failing drive.

 

Good.

 

Ah ok. So all this time I've probably been paying extra for these drives that have a warranty and when they fail I've just chucked them out rather than check if I can get a new one/return under warranty.  Just checked on Seagate's site and successfully registered my drive for warranty . Always good news ay.

 

Ok, i suppose anything is better than a failing drive.

[scottyseng]

7 minutes ago, lukesterboy said:

-snip-

Ah, be sure to check the 3TB drive (never hurts to be careful) as well.

 

Oh, wow, yeah, if you pay a lot, the WD Black drives have a five year warranty, but each one I own has always managed to die right after the warranty...well, except for this other six year old 1TB Black drive I have in my PC. Definitely don't just shuck the drives away though...the retail ones have warranty.

 

Yeah, you should be able to RMA (replace) the failing 2TB drive if it flat out dies or continues to reallocate sectors / or fails the Seatools test. Hopefully yours will die within the warranty period...

[lukesterboy]

4 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

Ah, be sure to check the 3TB drive (never hurts to be careful) as well.

 

Oh, wow, yeah, if you pay a lot, the WD Black drives have a five year warranty, but each one I own has always managed to die right after the warranty...well, except for this other six year old 1TB Black drive I have in my PC. Definitely don't just shuck the drives away though...the retail ones have warranty.

 

Yeah, you should be able to RMA (replace) the failing 2TB drive if it flat out dies or continues to reallocate sectors / or fails the Seatools test. Hopefully yours will die within the warranty period...

 

Yeh, when you say check you mean check desk or the WD test?

 

Yeh haha. I've never had a WD black drive and like you say my drives usually die after 3 or 4 years (usually) then i chuck them away.

 

Oh does my drive need to die for them to take it back, will they not take it back in it's current state?

[scottyseng]

Just now, lukesterboy said:

Yeh, when you say check you mean check desk or the WD test?

 

Yeh haha. I've never had a WD black drive and like you say my drives usually die after 3 or 4 years (usually) then i chuck them away.

 

Oh does my drive need to die for them to take it back, will they not take it back in it's current state?

Both, but I meant check disk.

 

Yeah, my WD Reds have lived for a while as well. 3-4 years is pretty normal for a hard drive life span, I myself usually plan to retire any older than four years.

 

Well, you have to prove that it's failing, like keep a log of how the reallocated sectors grow over a time period. They might just take it as it is now, but I've never dealt with Seagate warranty, only WD. Never hurts to try.