Does this S.M.A.R.T. status look bad for my hard disk?

nLinked

Member
Jul 11, 2006
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My HDD is showing a performance and reliability reading of 0% each. I checked the SMART status using numerous programs and SMART ID #3 (Spin Up Time) has a value of 1, and a threshold of 25. It's RAW value is 401740. Does its value of 1 next to its threshold of 25 mean good or bad?

All the other values are above their threshold, and this is the only one which is below it. I think a good spin up time value is supposed to be 253 as it is on my other identical HDD.

Is the spin up time the problem of this HDD? The status description of this drive says that it could fail imminently. But I can access its contents just fine for now.
 

Fox5

Diamond Member
Jan 31, 2005
5,957
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It's probably about to fail imminently.

I would back up whatever you can.
It may also be possible to save the drive. Get a bootable linux cd (such as pclivelinux) and boot it. Log in as root. Go into the terminal and type
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda
where hda is whatever your harddrive mounts as. (make sure to unmount it first) This will do a 'low level format' (technically it just zeroes the drive) that will restore your harddrive to the factory condition, with the bad areas marked as unreadable/unwritable so it won't try to access those anymore. This could potentially save your drive, or just delay failure for a bit longer, but either way it will destroy all data on your harddrive, thus meaning you need to back up your files.
 

RebateMonger

Elite Member
Dec 24, 2005
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Originally posted by: Modelworks
Anytime that Smart warns you of failure its best to heed the warning.
Yeah. SMART seldom works like it's supposed to, but if it ever DOES issue a warning, I'd be very concerned.
 

iluvdeal

Golden Member
Nov 22, 1999
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I'd also recommend running HD Tune on your drive and check out the Health tab. Any abnormal values should be highlighted.
 

SparkyJJO

Lifer
May 16, 2002
13,357
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SMART is rarely very smart - it tends to not know when a drive is actually failing - but if it does warn you then by all means heed the warning. Back up your data, RMA the drive.
 

ViRGE

Elite Member, Moderator Emeritus
Oct 9, 1999
31,516
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Originally posted by: SparkyJJO
SMART is rarely very smart - it tends to not know when a drive is actually failing - but if it does warn you then by all means heed the warning. Back up your data, RMA the drive.
SMART is overly conservative; it can't catch a lot of drive failures, but when it does catch something you're pretty much 100% guaranteed that a drive is going to take a dirt nap soon.
 

eplebnista

Lifer
Dec 3, 2001
24,123
36
91
Originally posted by: ViRGE
Originally posted by: SparkyJJO
SMART is rarely very smart - it tends to not know when a drive is actually failing - but if it does warn you then by all means heed the warning. Back up your data, RMA the drive.
SMART is overly conservative; it can't catch a lot of drive failures, but when it does catch something you're pretty much 100% guaranteed that a drive is going to take a dirt nap soon.

LOL

I like to use HDAT2(description) to read the SMART status because it doesn't need to be installed to run(boots from floppy or CD).
 

RebateMonger

Elite Member
Dec 24, 2005
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One of the few times that EVERYBODY agreed on something.

Now maybe we can work on that Windows vs. Linux question :)