Good afternoon, friends! This time let's talk about health checks hard drive. What I mean is we have a disk. It seems to work fine and doesn't crash. But we know nothing about him at all.

How long did he work? How many times has it been turned on, and what is the condition of its surface? All these questions are relevant if you do not want to wait until the disk with important information is full. This is also very important if you buy a hard drive second-hand.

Initial examination

The first step is to twist hard drive in your hands, make sure that all the seals are in place, that it is not broken, that is, it did not fall. Naturally, this must be done only when purchasing.

Then we read the information from the label. We are interested in the release date of the hard drive. Although these data do not say much, since old hard The disc may have been sitting on a shelf sealed, but it's still worth a look. And the newer the disk, the better.

However, you should not immediately turn away from the old hard drive. In my practice, there were cases when a 6-year-old hard drive worked for only 10 days, that is, it was practically new.

Checking the disc surface

We can say that the main stage of checking a hard drive for functionality is checking its surface. This is very important. Checking will allow you to understand what response time the disk sectors have.

If the sector response time is less than 100 milliseconds, the disk is in good condition. good condition.

If you come across sectors with a response time of 500 milliseconds or even unreadable sectors, I recommend not working with this disk. Since it is either already crumbling, or will start very soon.

If you really need to use this hard drive, try not to store on it at least important information. The scan program will remove unreadable sectors from the disk map (but they may appear again if the disk fails).

Analyzing SMART information

So, we checked the surface and decided that the disk is in good condition. Now I would like to understand how long this disk actually worked. The fact is that there is a certain amount of operating time that the manufacturer declares as “failure time.” This is some kind of guarantee.

Some manufacturers say that time work hard disk failure time is 50,000 hours. This is a lot, disks rarely survive to such a deadline.

It would be more realistic to limit the period to 20,000 - 25,000 hours, after which transfer the data to new disk, and take off the old one and don’t use it anymore.

For reference: one year of continuous work is 8760 hours.

All the information we need is stored on the hard drive itself. For this purpose, a special self-diagnosis technology called SMART was developed.

Special programs were also written that allow you to read information from SMART, analyze it and display it in a readable form to the end user.

For example, I connected a obviously bad disk to my computer (it crumbles). The fact that the disk was crumbling was established, again, using the MHDD program in advance.

Now we launch the CrystalDiskInfo program and it analyzes all connected hard drives. And it immediately symbolizes anxiety. This suggests that, in principle, only this program is enough to check the hard drive for functionality (although I recommend checking the surface separately).

The program showed that the disk contains unstable sectors that cause unrecoverable errors. These sectors are simply not readable.

Now let's imagine that the disk is fine. To do this, I switched to my hard drive tab. We are interested in the lines: “number of inclusions” and “ total time work." This will give a clear idea as to how long the drive has been running.

If the total operating time is less than 12,000 - 15,000 hours, and the number of starts is three - four thousand, such a disk can still be used. That is, you can buy it and even get a small discount (you know all the parameters, you can put pressure on the seller).

I would also like to draw your attention to the fact that bad disk could not work more than 15,000 hours. However, it had 5603 inclusions.

Conclusion

So, we have figured out how to check hard drives for functionality. I hope that the article will be useful to you. I also recommend

HDDScan

The program is designed to check hard drives and SSDs for bad sectors, viewing S.M.A.R.T. attributes, changing special settings, such as power management, spindle start/stop, acoustic mode adjustment, etc. The drive temperature value can be displayed in the taskbar.

Features and Requirements

Supported drive types:

• HDD with ATA/SATA interface.
• HDD with SCSI interface.
• HDD with USB interface(See Appendix A).
• HDD with FireWire or IEEE 1394 interface (see Appendix A).
• RAID arrays with ATA/SATA/SCSI interface (tests only).
• Flash drives with USB interface (tests only).
• SSD with ATA/SATA interface.

Drive tests:

• Test in linear verification mode.
• Test in linear reading mode.
• Test in linear recording mode.
• Butterfly reading mode test (artificial random reading test)

S.M.A.R.T.:

• Reading and analyzing S.M.A.R.T. parameters from disks with ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire interface.
• Reading and analyzing log tables from SCSI drives.
• Launch S.M.A.R.T. tests on drives with ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire interfaces.
• Temperature monitor for drives with ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire/SCSI interfaces.

Additional features:

• Reading and analysis of identification information from drives with ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire/SCSI interfaces.
• Changing AAM, APM, PM parameters on drives with ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire interfaces.
• View information about defects on a drive with a SCSI interface.
• Spindle start/stop on drives with ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire/SCSI interface.
• Saving reports in MHT format.
• Printing reports.
• Skin support.
• Command line support.
• Support for SSD drives.

Requirements:

• Operating system: Windows XP SP3, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 10 (NEW).
• The program should not be run from a drive operating in read-only mode.

User Interface

Main view of the program at startup

Rice. 1 Main type of program

Main window controls:

• Select Drive – a drop-down list that contains all supported drives in the system. The drive model and serial number are displayed. Nearby there is an icon that determines the expected type of drive.
• S.M.A.R.T. button – allows you to get a report on the state of the drive based on S.M.A.R.T attributes.
• TESTS button – displays a pop-up menu with a selection of read and write tests (see Figure 2).
• TOOLS Button – Shows a pop-up menu for selection available items disk management and functions (see Fig. 3).
• More button – shows a drop-down menu with program controls.

When you click the TESTS button, a pop-up menu offers you one of the tests. If you select any test, the test dialog box will open (see Figure 4).

Rice. 2 Test menu

When you press the TOOLS button, a pop-up menu will prompt you to choose from the following options:

Rice. 3 Function menu

• DRIVE ID – Generates an identification information report.
• FEATURES – opens a window additional features programs.
• S.M.A.R.T. TEST – opens the S.M.A.R.T window. tests: Short, Extended, Conveyance.
• TEMP MON – starts the temperature monitoring task.
• COMMAND – opens a command line build window.

Test Dialog Box

Rice. 4 Test dialog box

Controls:

• The FIRST SECTOR field is the initial logical number of the sector to be tested.
• Field SIZE – the number of logical sector numbers for testing.
• Field BLOCK SIZE – block size in sectors for testing.
• Previous button – returns to the main program window.
• Next button – adds a test to the task queue.

Test capabilities and limitations:

• Only one surface test can be run at a time. This is due to the fact that the author of the program has not yet been able to obtain stable, high-quality results when running 2 or more tests simultaneously (on different drives).
• A test in Verify mode can have a block size limit of 256, 16384 or 65536 sectors. This is due to the way Windows works.
• The test in Verify mode may not work correctly on USB/Flash drives.
• When testing in Verify mode, the drive reads a block of data into the internal buffer and checks its integrity; no data is transferred through the interface. The program measures the readiness time of the drive after performing this operation after each block and displays the results. Blocks are tested sequentially - from minimum to maximum.
• When testing in Read mode, the drive reads data into the internal buffer, after which the data is transmitted through the interface and stored in the program's temporary buffer. The program measures the total time of drive readiness and data transfer after each block and displays the results. Blocks are tested sequentially - from minimum to maximum.
• When testing in Erase mode, the program prepares a block of data filled with a special pattern with a sector number and transfers the data to the drive, the drive writes the received block ( the information in the block is irretrievably lost!). The program measures the total time of block transmission and recording and drive readiness after each block and displays the results. Blocks are tested sequentially - from minimum to maximum.
• Testing in Butterfly Read mode is similar to testing in Read mode. The difference is in the order in which the blocks are tested. Blocks are processed in pairs. The first block in the first pair will be Block 0. The second block in the first pair will be Block N, where N is the last block of the given section. The next pair will be Block 1, Block N-1, etc. Testing ends in the middle of a given area. This test measures reading and positioning time.

Task management window

Rice. 5 Task manager

This window contains the task queue. This includes all the tests that the program runs, as well as the temperature monitor. The manager allows you to remove tests from the queue. Some tasks can be paused or stopped.

Double-clicking on an entry in the queue brings up a window with information about the current task.

Test information window

The window contains information about the test, allows you to pause or stop the test, and also generates a report.

Graph Tab:

Contains information on the dependence of testing speed on the block number, which is presented in the form of a graph.

Rice. 6 Graph Tab

Map Tab:

Contains information about the dependence of testing time on the block number, which is presented in the form of a map.

Rice. 7 Map tab

You can select Block Processing Time in milliseconds. Each tested block that took longer than the "Block Processing Time" will be logged in the "Report" tab.

Report tab:

Contains information about the test and all blocks whose testing time is greater than the “Block Processing Time”.

Rice. 8 Report tab

Identification information

The report contains information about the main physical and logical parameters of the drive.

The report can be printed and saved to an MHT file.

Rice. 9 Example of identification information window

S.M.A.R.T. report

The report contains information about the performance and health of the drive in the form of attributes. If, according to the program, the attribute is normal, then there is a green icon next to it. Yellow indicates attributes that you should pay special attention to; as a rule, they indicate some kind of drive malfunction. Red denotes attributes that are outside the norm.

Reports can be printed or saved to an MHT file.

Rice. 10 Example of a S.M.A.R.T. report

Temperature monitor

Allows you to evaluate the storage temperature. Information is displayed in the taskbar, as well as in a special test information window. Rice. 11 contains readings for two drives.

Rice. 11 Temperature monitor in the taskbar

For ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire drives, the information window contains 2 values. The second value is displayed in the taskbar.

The first value is taken from the Airflow Temperature attribute, the second value is taken from the HDA Temperature attribute.

Rice. 12 Temperature monitor for ATA/SATA disk

For SCSI drives, the information window contains 2 values. The second value is displayed in the taskbar.

The first value contains the maximum permissible temperature for the drive, the second shows the current temperature.

Rice. 13 Temperature monitor for SCSI disk

S.M.A.R.T. tests

The program allows you to run three types of S.M.A.R.T. tests:

1. Short test – usually lasts 1-2 minutes. Checks the main components of the drive, and also scans a small area of ​​the drive surface and sectors located in the Pending-List (sectors that may contain read errors). The test is recommended for quickly assessing the condition of the drive.
2. Extended test – usually lasts from 0.5 to 60 hours. Checks the main components of the drive, and also completely scans the surface of the drive.
3. Conveyance test – usually lasts several minutes. Checks drive nodes and logs, which may indicate improper storage or transportation of the drive.

A SMART test can be selected from the SMART Tests dialog box, which is accessed by clicking the SMART TESTS button.

Rice. 14 SMART Tests Dialog Box

Once selected, the test will be added to the Tasks queue. Information window S.M.A.R.T. test can display the execution and completion status of a task.

Rice. 15 Information window S.M.A.R.T. test

Additional features

For ATA/SATA/USB/FireWire drives, the program allows you to change some parameters.

1. AAM – function controls drive noise. Enabling this function allows you to reduce drive noise due to smoother positioning of the heads. At the same time, the drive loses a little performance during random access.
2. APM function allows you to save drive power by temporarily reducing the rotation speed (or completely stopping) the drive spindle during idle time.
3. PM – function allows you to set the spindle stop timer for certain time. When this time is reached, the spindle will be stopped, provided that the drive is in idle mode. Accessing the drive by any program forces the spindle to spin up and the timer is reset to zero.
4. The program also allows you to force stop or start the drive spindle. Accessing the drive by any program forces the spindle to spin.

Rice. 16 Information window for additional ATA/SATA drive capabilities

For SCSI drives, the program allows you to view defect lists and start/stop the spindle.

Rice. 17 Information window for additional SCSI drive capabilities

Using the Command Line

The program can build command line to control some drive parameters and save this line to a .bat or .cmd file. When you run such a file, the program is called in the background, changes the drive parameters in accordance with the specified ones, and closes automatically.

Rice. 18 Command line build window

Appendix A: USB/FireWire Drives

If the drive is supported by the program, then tests are available for it, S.M.A.R.T. functions and additional features.

If the drive is not supported by the program, then only tests are available for it.

USB/FireWire drives supported by the program:

Maxtor Personal Storage (USB2120NEP001)

Storage	Controller chip
StarTeck IDECase35U2	Cypress CY7C68001
WD Passpopt	Unknown
Iomega PB-10391	Unknown
Seagate ST9000U2 (PN: 9W3638-556)	Cypress CY7C68300B
Seagate External Drive (PN: 9W286D)	Cypress CY7C68300B
Seagate FreeAgentPro	Oxford
CASE SWEXX ST010	Cypress AT2LP RC7
Vantec CB-ISATAU2 (adapter)	JMicron JM20337
Beyond Micro Mobile Disk 3.5" 120GB	Prolific PL3507 (USB only)
Maxtor Personal Storage 3100	Prolific PL2507
In-System ISD300A
	SunPlus SPIF215A
Toshiba USB Mini Hard Drive	Unknown
USB Teac HD-15 PUK-B-S	Unknown
Transcend StoreJet 35 Ultra (TS1TSJ35U-EU)	Unknown
AGEStar FUBCP	JMicron JM20337
USB Teac HD-15 PUK-B-S	Unknown
	Prolific 2571
All Drives That Support SAT Protocol	Majority of Modern USB controllers

USB/FireWire drives that the program may support:

Storage	Controller chip
AGEStar IUB3A	Cypress
AGEStar ICB3RA	Cypress
AGEStar IUB3A4	Cypress
AGEStar IUB5A	Cypress
AGEStar IUB5P	Cypress
AGEStar IUB5S	Cypress
AGEStar NUB3AR	Cypress
AGEStar IBP2A2	Cypress
AGEStar SCB3AH	JMicron JM2033x
AGEStar SCB3AHR	JMicron JM2033x
AGEStar CCB3A	JMicron JM2033x
AGEStar CCB3AT	JMicron JM2033x
AGEStar IUB2A3	JMicron JM2033x
AGEStar SCBP	JMicron JM2033x
AGEStar FUBCP	JMicron JM2033x
Noontec SU25	Prolific PL2507
Transcend TS80GHDC2	Prolific PL2507
Transcend TS40GHDC2	Prolific PL2507
I-O Data HDP-U series	Unknown
I-O Data HDC-U series	Unknown
Enermax Vanguard EB206U-B	Unknown
Thermaltake Max4 A2295	Unknown
Spire GigaPod SP222	Unknown
Cooler Master - RX-3SB	Unknown
MegaDrive200	Unknown
RaidSonic Icy Box IB-250U	Unknown
Logitech USB	Unknown

USB/FireWire drives that the program does not support:

Storage	Controller chip
Matrix	Genesis Logic GL811E
Pine	Genesis Logic GL811E
Iomega LDHD250-U	Cypress CY7C68300A
Iomega DHD160-U	Prolific PL-2507 (modified firmware)
Iomega
Maxtor Personal Storage 3200	Prolific PL-3507 (modified firmware)
Maxtor One-Touch	Cypress CY7C68013
Seagate External Drive (PN-9W2063)	Cypress CY7C68013
Seagate Pocket HDD	Unknown
SympleTech SympleDrive 9000-40479-002	CY7C68300A
	Myson Century CS8818
	Myson Century CS8813

Appendix B: SSD drives

Support for a particular drive largely depends on the controller installed on it.

SSD drives supported by the program:

Storage	Controller chip
OCZ Vertex, Vertex Turbo, Agility, Solid 2	Indilinx IDX110M00
Super Talent STT_FTM28GX25H	Indilinx IDX110M00
Corsair Extreme Series	Indilinx IDX110M00
Kingston SSDNow M-Series	Intel PC29AS21AA0 G1
Intel X25-M G2	Intel PC29AS21BA0 G2
OCZ Throttle	JMicron JMF601
Corsair Performance Series	Samsung S3C29RBB01
Samsung SSDs	Samsung Controllers
Crucial and Micron SSDs	Some Marvel Controllers

SSD drives that the program may support:

Additional information

Version HDDScan 3.3 can be downloaded version 2.8

Support:

aass, didn't use it. But I note that Victoria and MHDD are proven tools for serious diagnostics.

And Windows 7 can track SMART information. It will warn you if anything happens.

aass

Vadim Sterkin, Thanks for the answer and for the topic!
I agree with the assessment of the Victoria and MHDD programs, I myself use Victoria for serious diagnostics, but I try to test other programs, everything is learned by comparison.)

Dmitry

When checking the hard drive with a standard program on Windows 7, it says that bad clusters were detected in null.sys... what kind of driver is this?

Dmitry

Vadim Sterkin,

thanks...can the system slow down because of it?

Sanyok

Hello.
Ran (hypothetically) checking drive C: from GUI with parameters similar to your screen. Clicked the "Schedule disk check" button. Changed my mind. How to cancel this one-time check system disk before rebooting the system?
I myself assume that it may be entered into the Task Scheduler.” But I want to know for sure. I see no point in experimenting. Since, after such a check was completed successfully once (in practical reality), it would be entered into the “Scheduler” even as a one-time check, and should, in theory, be saved. After all, tasks from the “Scheduler” do not have the ability to self-delete (I think so). But I didn’t find any traces in the “Planner”. As you probably know, I didn’t receive an answer on the Internet or on the forum.

Simply put, I want to know where this mythical “Check Schedule” is located and what methods and methods Windows 7 offers for adjusting it. And then it turns out like this - click, and ala-ulu...

Sanyok

Yeah...
There were graphics, but they all came out. This is some kind of graffiti, black and white, with a register. Just like Battleship Potemkin.
(Yes, I Googled, but really for a slightly different request). Thank you.
You can plan this by checking two boxes in the chart, and canceling by going to the register. They got smart here. Well, okay, there’s nothing to do - I’ll post in the forum.

Yes, by the way, does it make sense to check the second (bottom) checkbox if the system is on an SSD? After all, as far as my knowledge is sufficient, the SSD controller itself periodically (when idle) scans the memory for faulty cells.
And this second checkbox, by definition, is intended to check for broken cells on the surface of the HDD.

Sanyok

Sanyok,

You turn on your TV with the remote control and set the wake-up timer. The next morning you wake up to the music of your favorite music channel. And life flows smoothly and measuredly. But at one fine moment it dawns on you - after all, tomorrow is Sunday. No problem, you tell yourself. With a slight movement of your hand and a screwdriver, without unplugging the TV from the mains, you remove the back cover, quickly replace a couple of resistors on the board and you’re done. Tomorrow you can sleep peacefully until lunchtime.
Do you feel what I mean?

Vadim Sterkin: Sanya, what do you mean, smart? You don’t have to split hairs by pressing all sorts of strange buttons, and everything will be fine :)

It's really funny, but also of course, of course Truth.
Yes, but it’s not entirely appropriate. I don’t see anything unpredictable or completely incomprehensible in checking the disk. And the conversation was about the fact that if you have already provided a graphical opportunity to schedule such a task, then be kind enough to provide the same opportunity to disable it, and not through one place (the registry). Either remove graphics when planning (do planning only through CMD), or provide the ability to disable this task using the graphical interface. As an engineer, in my technical practice and in the practice of interfaces of various industrial programs and IT, this is the first time I have come across something like this. Yes, and in Windows OS too.
That’s what I wanted to convey when I said, “We’ve been clever.”
When faced with a question, I noticed that this function causes complaints from the user in terms of frequent independent launches. But let's not talk about that. As unrelated to the topic.
And of course, thanks for the comments. Everything is clear to me here.

Regarding the bottom daw:

To perform a thorough disk scan, select the Scan and Repair option. bad sectors" In this mode, the scanning program attempts to find and correct physical errors on the hard drive itself, which may take much longer.

It doesn't say anything about the file system. More about physical disabilities. Some of us are wrong. Or I didn't understand something.
And further in the text:

To check for both file and physical errors, select both options: Automatically fix system errors and Scan for and repair bad sectors.

Please comment. I would like clarity on the issue.
So as not to press “all sorts of strange buttons”, and everything was fine. :-)

Vyacheslav

I am very surprised by the possibilities of checking and restoring a disk under Windows 8. Changing the partition size to increase using Acronis programs Disk Director 11 completed with errors. I wanted to increase the size of the system disk using the empty space on the adjacent partition by 200 GB. As a result, this program reports that everything is OK, and the disk size in Explorer has not changed. I checked the disk using the OS - it said that there were errors and needed to be rebooted. After the reboot, nothing changed and a request appeared to reboot to fix it. As you can already guess, this also did not help. As a result, we have lost 200 GB, despite the fact that Acronis says everything is ok, but the system is not able to correct the errors found. Sadness. Do I need to format it?

Vyacheslav

Vadim Sterkin,

In fact, under Windows 7, a similar operation was always performed without problems. I always perform the task of expanding/narrowing a partition in 2 stages: first, we cut off a piece of space from the partition being compressed and transfer it to the “unallocated space” status from the required end of the partition, and then we expand another partition using this space (I do everything manually in 2 reboots in case of “jambs”, because Acronis performs a group of operations very strangely. There is a sad experience under Windows XP). So, if under Windows 7, after checking the disk, everything returned to normal and the free space did not disappear so easily, then under Windows 8 Acronis completed the first stage successfully, and when performing the second it broke down with errors, although then it reports that “everything is fine.” The problem was eventually resolved by booting from a Live CD from Acronis. It's a pity that this cannot be done under Windows 8. And I was counting so much on the “improved checking and correction of file system errors” promoted in the media. Of course, it is very difficult to trust that checking and background diagnostics of FS problems is working correctly. It is very confusing that the time to scan one partition under Windows 7 and under Windows 8 differs by orders of magnitude, for the better for the latter. Are all problems really so easily and quickly fixed? Maybe Windows 8 simply doesn’t notice most of them, or even worse, ignores them?

Vyacheslav

Vadim Sterkin,

Well, what option is there in Windows 8 to expand the partition size? I saw the Disk Management snap-in. Well, I didn’t see how it’s possible to cut the size of a logical volume from the desired end using “standard means”. There's also no way to move a partition within the unallocated space. If there is an analogue that I missed, tell me. Along the way, you did not quite correctly understand what I meant by the phrase “I had a bad experience under Windows XP.” And it was like this: after a reboot, this operation was performed and at that moment the electricity went out. Thus, I lost 2 partitions, although, in theory, there could have been 3 options: the second partition, from which space was taken away due to the incompleteness of the operation of moving NTFS service zones, would have been lost, or only system partition(although this is unlikely), or both partitions would be fine, with some area of ​​unallocated space between them. But I was very “lucky”. Let’s skip the topic of uninterruptible power supplies and it turns out that Acronis is a respected company, and their products are sometimes dangerous to use in any way in the absence of alternatives from the OS. And then another “surprise” emerged. And even here everything is fine with the power supply. But as I already noted, the last problem was solved by booting from a Live CD from Acronis and a classic disk check, and not the over-optimized one from Windows 8, the benefits of which I have not yet felt. It seems to be there, but there seems to be no point. Or maybe I was using the disk check tool wrong. Unfortunately, such “optimization” still raises more questions and mistrust in me than answers.

Vyacheslav

Vadim Sterkin,

Irina

Conducted diagnostics of hard Windows disk(chkdsk). There were no messages, but later it turned out that there was no free space. Although before the check, less than 50% of the disk was full. And now it shows 931 GB occupied. Was all the free space wasted? The disc is six months old.

I forgot to say, after that I checked with Victoria and reported that there weren’t even any errors.

Irina

This is not the case for me. It's not about system disk. Oh external drive. I’ve already found out that the system marked all the free space as bad blocks. Now I’m trying to figure out whether it’s a failure or whether the screw has died.

Sergey

Vadim, I have the following problem: After launch chkdsk utility disk check, if both “daws” are checked, asks to reboot and the check is performed, I don’t know what to call it, but it looks like MS-DOS - lines run quickly on a black background. After the next reboot, I look at the information in Windows logs— Appendix, text in English, “many letters,” but the meaning can be understood from a single sentence: “Windows has checked the file system and found no problems." At the same time, a few lines above I was kindly informed that, they say, “Cleaning up 31 unused security descriptors.” Sometimes it is not “31 unused security descriptors” that are cleared, but more or, conversely, less. That is, something is still not quite right, and the program corrects it a little. Like, overall everything is fine, but the Bug died. So, no matter how many times I run this chkdsk, it requires a reboot to correct these errors, nothing else is detected. Previously, on another machine in Windows XP this happened rarely, but now it happens time after time.
The SSD drive is about a quarter occupied. The system is legal Windows 7 x64 Professional and is automatically updated. If you do not run a disk check, then there is no reason to worry, everything works fine, does not glitch, does not crash. So, in connection with this, the question is - maybe there is no need to spoil your mood. On the website Microsoft solutions I didn’t find any problems with these file system errors, and are they really errors?

far_town2 Kulyasov

Are there any methods to check if the power supply has enough power? And could it be because of him insufficient power Are there freezes/errors in games?

A hard drive (hard drive, hdd) is the main storage device for information on your laptop or PC. Its name is associated with physical properties: Unlike floppy disks, disk data is recorded on hard plates, which can be made of aluminum or glass using the principle of magnetic recording. Very often, system slowness is associated with a faulty hdd, so before you send your laptop for repair, find out how to check the hard drive on your laptop and try to fix any errors you find yourself. We tell you how to do this in Russian in this article.

How to test a laptop hard drive?

HDD diagnostics using built-in tools of the Windows operating system

Regardless of which version of the OP you are using, the system has special built-in functions and utilities with which you can test the hard drive on a laptop.

Option one: in the “My Computer” folder, select the hard drive that you want to scan for errors. Next, click Properties > Tools > Run Scan. The computer can simply make a report analysis, or it can immediately correct hdd errors(to do this, check the boxes for requests for automatic corrections system errors and recovery of system sectors). After this setting, click the Start button. If the system displays an error due to the inability to use at this moment (usually this happens when scanning drive C), select “Schedule disk scan”. After this, you just need to restart your laptop (or PC), and during boot time a test for problems will occur. Its duration can vary from a minute to an hour, and after that the OP will be launched.

Option two: check disk utility. Detects file system errors on a hard drive or floppy disk and corrects them. To launch it, open the command line console (necessarily with administrator rights) and enter CHKDSK command[volume[filename]] /F/V/R/X/I/C/L[:size]]/B , where

“[volume]” is the disk being checked (written as a letter + a colon, for example C:),

“[file name]” files that need to be scanned (if you need to scan the entire disk, there is no need to enter this),

/F means fix errors in the volume,

/V outputs full path and the name of each file,

/R executes a command to search for damaged sectors and restore the contents that survived (the presence of the /F command is required for its execution),

/X will pre-mount the volume if necessary,

/I will enable less strict checking of index elements, /C will command skip checking of loops inside,

/L[:size]] will set the size log file,

/B Enables re-evaluation of damaged clusters.

At the same time, the full set of commands is used extremely rarely; the most common commands are /F and /R (when entering the letter designations of all other commands in the console, you just need to skip them, for example chkdsk D: /F/R). After entering the command in the console line to check the disk for errors, you will be prompted to run this command the next time you start the system; to confirm, press Y + Enter and reboot.

P.S. You can find out how to launch the administrator command line for your version of the operating system on the Internet; for example, in Windows XP, to open it you need to go to Start > All Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt.

It is quite possible that performing a disk check using the console and the utility is not clear to you, especially if you are not very familiar with the system. Well, don’t despair: special software has been developed and released especially for such cases, which will help you test not only more clearly, but also more completely. For those who still have not decided on the issue of whether to buy a laptop or a desktop computer, we have collected the most popular free programs that will cope with the task.

Diagnosing the hard drive for errors using various programs

The most common program for scanning a hard drive for errors is Victoria. Although it should immediately be noted that its use also requires some experience and ability to handle software, it is not intended for beginners. You can download the program image for free from the official website. After this, we take the following steps in the following sequence:

1. Unzip the downloaded data;
2. Burn data to CD/DVD;
3. Boot from the disk on which you recorded the files;
4. Choose Victoria program for device;
5. After launching the program interface, we find required disk(if the program itself has not identified it, press F2 to do this): press P and select required volume(by the way, for SATA interface you need to select the HDD port “Ext. PCI ATA/SATA");
6. To check the disk surface, press the F4 key;
7. After physical check laptop/computer hdd surface, performed with correction of malfunctioning areas;
   The procedure is long, usually from 40 minutes to 2-3 hours.
8. Finish: Remove the disk and restart the system.

Well, despite the popularity of this software, it is obvious that Victoria, being a powerful tool for diagnosing and correcting disk errors, is not intended for beginners. But besides this, there are several other good programs that can cope with such a function as checking the hdd on a laptop/PC.

Seagate SeaTools – free program for beginners in the field of verification hard drives. It can also correct identified errors, which means it is in no way inferior to the widespread Victoria program.

The program tests disks of all brands. You can download it for free from the manufacturer’s official website. It can work on two platforms - as a utility for Windows (while waiting for this, download “SeaTools for Windows") or as an iso image that is downloaded to a separate disk, similar to iso image Victoria (for this we download “ Seagate for DOS" from the website). At the same time, its significant advantage over the previously discussed program will be a complete Russian-language reference description-instructions on how to check the hdd on a laptop/PC (help section). It will help you understand the processes and results of the disk scan.

Active users similar software will agree that Seagate SeaTools and Victoria programs are perhaps the most useful remedies in identifying and eliminating hard drive errors. If the first is suitable for beginners, especially for users from Russia, since it has a Russian-language version, then the second will be useful for experienced users, or at least for those people who can fluently understand English vocabulary associated with computer technologies. There are other programs that will allow you to do testing, but they are either suitable for a certain type of disk or do not identify hard drive errors as fully as possible; that's why we only analyzed best options hdd checks.

And finally, our general advice for all those who feel abnormal hdd work on a laptop or desktop computer (for example, its excessively noisy operation) and in general for all those who have personal computers: be sure to back up your data and be prepared for lengthy repairs or even replacing hard disk of your equipment.

Or removable USB HDD devices are almost the most common. That is why comprehensive measures for checking the hard drive should be given priority attention. Now we will try to briefly consider what it is HDD check in several main areas, and we will give an understanding of the basics of the methodology for correcting errors of various types.

Why do errors occur on the hard drive?

There are many reasons for failures, both in software and in physical terms. First of all, this includes a sudden power outage, which is accompanied by a short-term increase in voltage. And if you consider that at that moment, say, data was being copied, then it becomes clear that errors cannot be avoided.

Something similar is observed in the case of incorrect shutdown of the operating system, when forced shutdown computer terminal or laptop by long pressing the power button.

It’s good that the next time you turn it on standard program to check the HDD, which is initially present in any Windows OS, starts automatically. True, not everything is so simple here either. The fact is that the HDD check can start again and again during subsequent system boots. This is due to the fact that the “native” application simply cannot fix system problems. hard mistakes disk automatically. About how to get rid of permanent launch this process will be discussed a little later.

HDD check: main directions

Before we begin to consider the operation of numerous hard drive testing and error correction tools, let’s consider the main directions that are provided for the comprehensive verification system.

So, for example, the simplest method is considered to be viewing detailed information about the device. Today there are quite a lot of different utilities like Everest, CPU-Z or CPUID Hardware Monitor. It must be said that such programs provide the most detailed characteristics of the device, and at startup they even check HDD speeds(or rather, spindle rotation speed).

Another direction is testing the hard drive for system errors with a view to subsequently correcting them. IN in this case The HDD is checked for bad sectors.

This process is somewhat reminiscent of defragmentation, only in the case of defragmentation of the hard drive, frequently used files and applications are moved to the fastest areas of the HDD (with a change in the physical rather than logical address). Checking the HDD for bad sectors works in a similar way. The program itself reads the current address from the damaged sector, and then rewrites it into a normally functioning one. As is already clear, in this case the logical address remains unchanged.

Third priority direction is to check the surface of the disk, because hard drives have a limited service life, and physical damage simply cannot be avoided. It is clear that by the end of its service life the hard drive may simply crumble, and in most cases it will have to be thrown away. Although, if the damage is not too serious, you can restore the hard drive, for example, by using special recovery utilities. We will consider them separately.

It goes without saying that you cannot ignore data recovery on inoperative hard drives. Actually, this is often done by various federal services when investigating computer crimes committed by hackers and seizing the corresponding equipment from them. But let's not get into the weeds. HDD sectors can also be checked by an ordinary user. The main thing is the presence of a set of special utilities.

Checking HDD and fixing errors using Windows

Now a few words about the built-in operating system tools Windows family. They also include HDD checking. Windows 7, for example, is no different from its predecessors and successors (XP, Vista, 8, 10).

This tool is called from the usual “Explorer” by clicking right click manipulator (computer mouse) on the corresponding disk or logical partition. Properties are selected in the menu, after which you go to the appropriate tabs, where you can carry out maintenance.

When calling such a service, it is strongly recommended to set parameters that, when activated, will scan the HDD. Windows will also be able to automatically correct system errors. True, this approach may not always help. It happens that the system issues a warning that it is not possible to automatically correct errors.

In this case, it is better to use the command line or the “Run” menu, where a variety of commands are written depending on what exactly needs to be done. The simplest command This type is "chkdisk c: /f" (testing with automatic correction of system errors). In relation to file NTFS systems you can use "chkntfs /x c:". By the way, it is manipulations of this type that allow you to get rid of the annoying check of the hard drive when rebooting the computer terminal.

In general, it is better to read reference information about the use of this or that command, because checking HDD can be done in completely different ways depending on what characters will be entered after entering the main command.

Informer programs

Regarding information applications, then you can find quite a lot of them. As mentioned above, the most well-known are utilities like CPU-Z or Everest. But these are, so to speak, general purpose programs.

CrystalDiscInfo is considered to be the most acceptable and most powerful utility that combines the functions of an informer and a scanner. By the way, it is capable of not only displaying information on the device, but also even controlling some basic parameters, say, changing the spindle speed.

Programs for checking HDDs for bad sectors

Speaking about what a program is for checking HDDs for bad sectors, it is worth special mentioning this powerful utility, like Victoria, created by a Belarusian developer.

The application can work as in standard mode in Windows environment, and in DOS emulation. What is most interesting is that it is in DOS that the utility shows its maximum capabilities.

Checking the disc surface

Testing the hard drive surface (Surface Test mode) can be used in standard means Windows OS itself, or you can turn to specialized utilities such as HDDScan.

It is noteworthy that the software package itself is available in the form of a portable version and does not require installation on a hard drive. It goes without saying that you can start the scanning process even from a regular flash drive, using the default settings or applying your own (they are located in the Process section).

Of course, the program will be able to identify problems with the integrity of the HDD surface, but it will not be able to revive a damaged hard drive. But there is a way out here too.

Reanimation programs

Even resuscitation damaged hard disk or removable USB HDD can be produced thanks to a unique development called HDD Regenerator, which, when it first appeared, caused quite a stir in the field of modern computer technology.

According to the developers themselves, this application is capable of restoring physically damaged sectors of the HDD surface using magnetization reversal technology. There is no point for the average user to delve into all the details technological process. The main thing is that the program works perfectly. From the outside it may seem strange: how can you remagnetize a hard drive? programmatically? However, in combination with the use of physical methods, this process has become possible for use in stationary computer systems. The hard drive doesn't even need to be dismantled.

Data Recovery

With data recovery, the situation is somewhat worse. This is understandable, because not every utility is capable of working like HDD Regenerator.

Of course, we can recommend using some software packages such as Acronis True Image. But such a utility works on the principle of creating a backup copy. In case of damage to the hard drive or accidental deletion of information, it is better to use tools like Recuva, PC Inspector File Recovery or Recover My Files. But they cannot provide a complete guarantee of data recovery, for example, in case of physical damage to the HDD.

By and large, with enough large volume hard drive, it is recommended to create backup copies of data in advance. Then you won’t have to look for specialized utilities or rack your brains over how to recover lost information.

Comprehensive solutions for HDD testing

In order to carry out a comprehensive check, including prompt receipt of information on the device, actions that include full check and fixing HDD failures and damage, data recovery, etc., it is better to use several software packages together. For example, in the worst case scenario, the combination might look like this:

• information stage - CrystalDiscInfo;
• full HDD check - Victoria;
• surface test - HDD Scan;
• recovery of a damaged hard drive - HDD Regenerator.

Which program is better?

It is not possible to say which program for checking HDD or removable media is the best, since almost all utilities have their own specific direction.

Basically, among the main applications for checking and automatic correction errors, the Victoria package (high-quality HDD error checking) can be especially highlighted, and in terms of disk recovery, HDD Regenerator undoubtedly takes the lead.

Conclusion

We briefly talked about what HDD checking is and what some types are intended for software products. However, in conclusion, it is worth noting that it is not recommended to bring your hard drive to an extreme state; you need to check it at least once a month. This approach will avoid many problems in the future.

In principle, you can set up an automatic check of the hard drive on a schedule, even using the standard Windows Task Scheduler, so as not to call the process every time manual mode. You can just choose the right time, but even here it is necessary to take into account the fact that when running process testing, working with the system will be extremely difficult.

By the way, even installing a conventional uninterruptible power supply or stabilizer will protect the hard drive from the harmful effects associated with power surges or power outages.