How much "damaged" is too damaged?

[thepregnantgod]

I have 24 drives currently - but a few of them have come up "damaged" with unreadable sectors.  I've moved all my data from them, formatted them, and then RMA'd those still under warranty.  However, I have a few 3TB drives that are marked damaged but the warranty has expired.  In your experience, when should I not risk using them?  Note, I will be using them in a 24 drive pool with triple duplication.  

 

In other words, how many sectors are too many sectors bad?  

Will using chkdsk /r (overnight because it takes so long) - make this a useable drive again?

 

I've posted a screen shot of the SMART details for a Seagate marked as damaged.

 

 

[Umfriend]

I think the official answer is that as long as the count does not increase, you're probably OK. Now I have never had HDD issues until recently and in that short experience, once they arise, they rise in numbers.

 

I have had chkdsk /r and formating (not quick formatting) seamingly correct errors (according to Windos) but the next scan would show these again.

 

My policy now is, once I get them I may give them *one* more chance. Otherwise, my son and I love to tear them apart and play around with them. It's a bit of a thrill holding just the motor with the disks spinning at 7200RPM.

[Christopher (Drashna)]

That really depends on the drive, and the manufacturer limits.

 

The Pending and uncorrectable sectors should get mapped to "reallocated sectors" during normal usage (or forced by a chkdsk /r pass, or a full format).

Generally, as long as these values are within specifications AND are not climbing quickly, the drive should be okay.

 

 

Also, since it seems that you're using Windows 8... you don't need to take the disk offline to scan it.

If you use "chkdsk /r /scan", it keeps the disk online and usable while it scans it.

[thepregnantgod]

Thanks!

[Christopher (Drashna)]

You're welcome.

 

if you have any other questions, don't hesitate to ask.

[thepregnantgod]

1. Drashna and others - you are very helpful. Quick responses - enjoying your product(s).

 

2. My concern is what to do with a particular drive (and future drives like below) where it has 16 uncorrectable sectors.  It is out of warranty so no chance of RMA'ing it.

 - I have formatted it (quick)

 - I have chkdsk /r /scan overnight

 - I then rescanned it and the 16 sectors are still bad

 

3. Is the drive useless?  I was under the impression that if the sectors are uncorrectable they'd be swapped out.  Thus, I can assume that there are actually many more bad sectors on the drive but they have been remapped already?

 

4. Thanks.  

[Christopher (Drashna)]

1. You are very welcome. I try to check the forums every day (after answering tickets). 
2. I answered this in your other thread. but to quickly summarize:

   To "fix" the sectors, you need to FULL format or you need to run the chkdsk /r

   After this, it should clear up the damaged/bad sectors on Scanner. You can (and may want to) verify the location of these sectors on the disk map in Scanner.

3. If the sectors are "uncorrectable" and are not being fixed by format/chkdsk.... there is basically two options:

   -Toss the disk (or pull it apart and have fun), or

   -Run a utility such as SpinRite (~$60, IIRC). SpinRite is an "offline" (boot disk) utility that does a very very low level scan. This should fix the issue. If not... then see the above line. Or suck it up and keep using it.

    

   And yes, you probably have many more remapped sectors. This happens normally during the life of the drive. Usually, it's denoted by the "Reallocated Sector Count" SMART value. 

4. You are very welcome.

[thepregnantgod]

Drashna, thanks for the quick response.

 

The chkdsk /r /scan seemingly did not remove the bad sectors/remap them, do anything.

 

I'm going to try format g:/fs:NTFS /p:2 (a 2 pass zero fill from an elevated command prompt).

 

It's a 3TB drive so not sure how long it will take.  After it completes, I'll scan it again with your scanner and report back.

[thepregnantgod]

Happy to report, the two pass zero fill above seemingly fixed it.  Scanner reported it healthy and the SMART attributes have changed as well.

 

[Christopher (Drashna)]

CHKDSK doesn't always fix the issues, unfortunately.

 

IMO, a "two pass" is excessive. The normal format process, when you don't specify /q (or "quick format" option), it does a full pass once.

And actually, the /p:x switch is for ADDITIONAL passes. So /p:2 means that it "zero-ed" three different times.

 

 

But regardless, I'm glad to hear that it fixed your issue. Hopefully no more issues with the disk.