Checkdisk on external drive, how to tell if it's ok?

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gubar

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Hi,

I've just done this since my external drive wasn't working correctly. I left it to run, and when I came back it had finished an no results were displayed.

By going to event viewer > system I can see that there are many instances of Warning (... has a bad block), though there is no mention after these if the fis operation was succesfull or not.

I ran it by right clicking on the drive and checking both boxes for the operation.

Other than starting to use it, is there a way to tell if the drive is now ok or not?

cheers

gubar
 
Normally
Start-->Run-->eventvwr.msc
Click on "Application"
In the "Source" column, look for the "Winlogon" item.
Double-click it and you should see the results of your Chkdsk.

But to manually create a log file of a Check Disk scan
Start-->Run-->cmd
Type in the following:
CHKDSK C: /F > C:\CHKDISKLOG.TXT (note: substitute "CHKDSK C" for your drive letter)

Hit your Enter key.

Click YES on the popup to reboot.

After CHKDSK has run type this in Start | Run...

C:\CHKDISKLOG.TXT

Notepad will open to allow you to view the results of Check Disk scan
 
Hi,

thanks for the response. Since posting, I've installed and ran HDDTest on the drive. It detected 4 bad blocks, a total of 0.2% of the drive. This was after I ran checkdisk again, so obviously it won't fix them.

Prior to that, I had deleted all the data on the drive, and reformatted it (full format, NFTS).

Is there anything else I can do, or is the drive bust? The other external drives I use in the enclosure work fine.

It is only 0.2% of the drive - though I am guessing that any bad blocks can render the drive unusable?

What actually happens it that when I transfer to it, the countdown dialogue that appears gets so far along, then just freezes on say "2 minutes", but even if I leave it for two hours it won't complete. Sometimes my system hangs and I have to reboot.

thanks for the input

gubar
 
How these programs work is, they test the "bad block" over and over and sometimes report the bad block as ok (ie wiping the data off it can (sometimes) fix it

Other times, the programs label the block "bad" (ironically) and therefore no other data can be written to it.

The only issue is, that once you receive one (or more) bad blocks, usually the drive starts getting more (ie the 0.2% went, why not the rest)

If a drive has been reported with a "bad spot" I would not trust it again
It will slow down access and possibly (likely) corrupt data

Best to replace
 
Thanks Kimsland,

I'll get myself a new one then for backup purposes.

cheers for your time,

gubar
 
Ok, been looking at replacements and I'm on a tight bugdet. It is only for use in an extrnal caddy, so speed isn't that much of an issue. As long as it works.

Seen these on amazon:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Generic-Har...2?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1215867422&sr=8-2

and

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Generic-Har...3?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1215867422&sr=8-3

Confusingly, though the second one is called "generic", it says by Raptor, and the guy who reviews it says he was lucky enough to get on by Hitachi. Not sure what the generic tag really means in reference to hard drives.

If anyone can advise if these look robust enough, that would be great.

cheersw

gubar
 
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