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Quickly scanning a hard drive for errors

  • 29-10-2011 1:49pm
    #1
    Priori
    Closed Accounts Posts: 421 ✭✭


    Hi guys,

    I was wondering if you could recommend some software, or a simple method whereby I could scan a terrabyte external HDD for errors. It's about half full, over 400GB, and while I was away recently it may have gotten damaged. It was sitting on a shelf with a lot of books, and the books must have been too heavy - when I came back the shelf, books and hard drive had crashed to the floor.

    I've tried using the Windows Vista scandisk to check the volume for errors, but it's going incredibly slow. Two hours and more than 100000 files later it's still only showing at 10% done (or less - can't tell precisely).

    If there's no other way, I'll just have to leave it overnight. I heard you can scan more quickly in safe mode, but as it's an external HDD, would it be picked up?

    Any help appreciated,

    Thanks.


Comments

  • #2
    TouchingVirus
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,582 ✭✭✭TouchingVirus


    Leave it doing the full scan, the impact with the floor isn't a good thing and the drive mechanisms could have been damaged. Dropping a hard drive can be a drive-killer, you're lucky it works at all :)


  • #3
    blorg
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 15,995 ✭✭✭✭blorg


    You can't speed it up, it has to look through the full drive and with a terabyte that is going to take a while. The good news is that if it works at all it is likely to be OK. Bear in mind 2.5" drives are substantially hardier than 3.5" drives; I have done some horrible things to 2.5" drives (sent flying off a top bunk bed, dropped laptop at 60km/h to have it roll down the hill into a river) and they have been fine.


  • #4
    jetski
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 820 ✭✭✭jetski


    run chkdsk


  • #5
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 94,272 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    download partedmagic cd

    boot up the computer from it

    on the desktop there is an drive icon that will get the drive to do it's build in self tests, short test will take about 1-2 minutes , long test will take about 3 hours for a drive that size

    note the self tests will only work if the controller in the extrnal drive will pass ATA commands ,- taking the drive out of the enclosure will break the warranty - with USB you are limited to a speed below the drives max speed so will take bleedin' ages to finish


    or just use an old version of hdtune to read the SMART info off the drive

    if the drive is making funny noises then backup important data off it now


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