bad sectors

[The_Unbeliever]

I threw the WD onto the braai and made it hot. Best move I eva made.

Did it go down well? Scrumptiously crunchable?

 

[GangStarr]

ye im using that proggie.... since last night its only 5% done

 

[JTech]

Odd... I backed up my 120 gig drive in 3-4 hours but then, that's because your drive is already struggling to read sectors, hence why it takes an age...

 

[GangStarr]

ok I got home last night and the est. time was 111hours32min**sec
erm.... i think its time to get a new HDD
but I wanna spend some cash on a graphics card ( i wanna play hitman:blood money)
hm..... what to do what to do

 

[ant1b0dy]

ok I got home last night and the est. time was 111hours32min**sec
erm.... i think its time to get a new HDD
but I wanna spend some cash on a graphics card ( i wanna play hitman:blood money)
hm..... what to do what to do

wow, if it's taking that long your hdd must be seriously buggered.

 

[disabled]

youu cant fix bad sectors. If they are bad, then so be it.

What you can do is remap bad sectors to UNUSED, working parts of the drive specifically meant for this purpose.
OK, lemme elaborate...
NO DRIVE HAS ZERO BAD SECTORS, they ALL have bad sectors, right outta the factory. BUT drive manufacturers cater for this in firmware and by actually adding extra capacity to the drive, so, in simple terms, your 160gb drive has probably got 161gb of drive platter space, with 1gb reserved for bad sector remapping. The remapping happens on the fly, transparent to the end user.

ergo, by the time you see bad sectors in your OS, it means the bad sector pool has been depleted already and you now have no "spare" sectors to remap...

Spinrite rereads sectors many many times, often extracting certain parts of the data, then stitching the data together and writing it to a known good sector, then either remapping the bad sector (if the drive firmware didnt do it) or marking it as permanently bad.

But, once you have bad sectors, they will always remain on the drive, there is no "fix"...and more than likely they will continue to increase in quantity.

Absolutely Correct...Some occasions it will inform you that there are too many bad sectors and cannot complete the operation...Meaning! 'It's time to get a New HDD'
I have used a HDD with bad sectors and used it for backing up files in an Emergency(Took the chance) for about a week I knew my limits of space provided...Once I got a new HDD tried to reformat bad sectors HDdrive...Guess What!...No Ways...

 

[nocilah]

i have had the same experience. bad sectors leading to a drive crashing. I learnt my lesson the hard way.

Although i now have an 80Gb drive that is dying but i use it for things i wont mind losing, but as murphy would have it... the drive has been stable for about a year and a half.

i best the moment i put something important on it it would crash

Also as far as i know what Werner has mentioned is in fact the truth, once a bad sector always a bad sector. HD factories need to make money

 

[GangStarr]

F**KKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! got home and my 111hours turned into 400 and sum this is not good. and looked around the drive and erm...... I need a lotta stuff on there this is not good. im gonna back most up on dvd ( using like 3 spindles.
BUT
I HAVE FAITH!!!! will a low level format help? of do I make a very nice wall mount out of it?
( I should have went Western digital I dropped it in the road and still worked…. Dam u maxitor)

 

[noswal]

I just successfully recovered use of an old drive (maxitor) with spinrite, first error found was it was set up wrong in the bios, after that was reset it then proceeded to check for surface errors.

 

[werner]

F**KKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! got home and my 111hours turned into 400 and sum this is not good. and looked around the drive and erm...... I need a lotta stuff on there this is not good. im gonna back most up on dvd ( using like 3 spindles.
BUT
I HAVE FAITH!!!! will a low level format help? of do I make a very nice wall mount out of it?
( I should have went Western digital I dropped it in the road and still worked…. Dam u maxitor)

there is no such thing as a low level format anymore. If you low level format a modern drive, you will ruin it forever. Low-level formatting died in the early 90's.

they make good clocks, if you buy a kit with the hands and mechanism, then use the platters for a nice shiny clock face.
Also, two wicked rare-earth magnets inside...proper strong things

 

[GangStarr]

there is no such thing as a low level format anymore. If you low level format a modern drive, you will ruin it forever. Low-level formatting died in the early 90's.

oh shyt!!!!! I just did a lowlevel format last night! should have read more....
not good... but i used a program to do it not dos. I just need to give it a quick format and repartition it. now im scared to go home

 

[werner]

no, you didnt low level format your drive.

start reading here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_formatting#Low-level_formatting_2

then go here
http://freepctech.com/pc/001/007.shtml

 

[GangStarr]

thnx bru
I almost shat myself. it makes sence now.
I will just finish it off at home tonight