[TriLUG] Dieing hard drive?

[Aaron S. Joyner]

Lance A. Brown wrote:

>How many sectors should generate read failures during a long selftest?
>  
>
None?

>I'm up past 25 and counting at this point.
>
Eek!  Time to recover what data you can, and move on.  In my experience, 
in your situation, the more you read from the drive the more it's going 
to go down hill.  Pick your critical files, pull them off, then try and 
do a full backup.  Take what you can and start to recover to a new drive.

>Every time I re-run the selftest it just coughs up another read failure
>on a new sector.
>  
>
I'm not sure if this is what you're running, but you should pull down 
Maxtor's PowerMax software to see what it thinks of your drive.  If it 
passes both tests, you're drive is probably fine.  If it fails, time to 
shop.  Note: this software requires windows to actually make the 
floppies that you boot from to diagnose the disk (how amazingly 
annoying).  You can find it here: 
http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/Maxtor/menuitem.3c67e325e0a6b1f6294198b091346068/?channelpath=/en_us/Support/Software%20Downloads/ATA%20Hard%20Drives&downloadID=22

>Time to start shopping for a disk deal?
>  
>
I'd recommend picking up something with a longer warranty than the (I'd 
guess 1yr) warranty on your existing Maxtor.  The Western Digital 160JB 
is a nice pick (7200rpm, 8MB cache).  It's a bit larger than your 
existing drive and (hopefully) with a 3yr warranty you'll have time to 
actually fill it up.  :)  Cost at NewEgg, $94.69 (after shipping)... 
although it's not in stock.  Cost at your local Intrex, $109.99.  Cost 
after your TriLUG discount (if you're a card-carrying member) $105.20.  
Yes, it's in stock.  :)  If you have the option to go Serial ATA, you 
might want to look at similar drives, although the prices and 
availability will be naturally different.

Unfortunately drives dying is par for the course these days.  Falling 
prices have roughly equated to falling quality, when considered in 
aggregate over the past ~8 years.  Hopefully the recent trend (led by 
Maxtor) back to 3yr warranties will hold the manufacturers to higher 
quality standards... but somehow I doubt it.

Aaron S. Joyner