WD HDD Increasing current pending sector count

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mydog2409

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Oct 2, 2014
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Hello everyone,

I am currently using 1 TB WD Blue HDD. Yesterday, I ran CrystalDiskInfo to check my HDD status because my system suddenly runs slower than normal. The software reported that the HDD health is "Caution" and the (C5) Current Pending Sector Count was 43 and now it has been increased to 121 (currently increasing slowly as I type).

After looking for clues on google for this issue, I think my HDD either is failing or having bad sector. So which one is true? And in case I have to buy a new HDD, what software could help me to transfer data from my failing HDD (hopefully most of it) to the new one?

Thanks for reading.
 
Solution
Solandri

Since this is a one-time thing, manually copying everything like that should be fine (you may have to turn on the verify after copy option). You may have to babysit it a bit - e.g. copy one main folder at a time, rather than the entire drive at once. Some of the copy bugs I've run across are more likely to show up when you're trying to copy millions of files at once.

In the future, you should implement a real backup system with incremental or differential backups. Macrium Reflect and Easeus ToDo seem to be popular...
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Solandri

Solandri

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Jan 4, 2012
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If the Pending Sector Count is increasing fast enough for you to actually notice it, your drive is failing. Probably a bearing is going (causing the heads to lose alignment with the tracks on the platters), or some debris has flaked or broken off inside and is in the process of destroying the platter surfaces as they spin.

Backup your data ASAP and replace the drive. I use Teracopy, but have found the current version to be buggy (I'm still on 2.27). I've heard good things about Robocopy and Supercopier. The features you're looking for are the ability to fail a copy on a file-by-file basis, and verify after copy. With Windows' default copier, if you try to copy a folder and a single file fails to copy, the entire copy process stops and you don't know which files were successfully copied and which weren't.

https://www.raymond.cc/blog/12-file-copy-software-tested-for-fastest-transfer-speed/2/
 
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mydog2409

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Oct 2, 2014
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Hello Solandri,

How should I proceed with the backup? I intend to setup the new and old HDDs on my PC, log into Windows and use a copy software which you mentioned to backup data. Will that be enough or another method should be use?

P/s: My OS is on another drive so there shoud be no problem to use copy software on Windows.
P/s 2: I read a few old threads on the forum and people suggested that I can boot into Ubuntu to start the backup. Is there any different than using Windows to backup data?
 
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Solandri

Solandri

Illustrious
Jan 4, 2012
4,919
98
39,240

Since this is a one-time thing, manually copying everything like that should be fine (you may have to turn on the verify after copy option). You may have to babysit it a bit - e.g. copy one main folder at a time, rather than the entire drive at once. Some of the copy bugs I've run across are more likely to show up when you're trying to copy millions of files at once.

In the future, you should implement a real backup system with incremental or differential backups. Macrium Reflect and Easeus ToDo seem to be popular choices. These will backup all your files into a single file (preferably on an external hard drive), and allow you to restore files by navigating that single file. The incremental/differential part means when you do the next backup, only the stuff which has changed gets backed up so it takes considerably less time.

P/s: My OS is on another drive so there shoud be no problem to use copy software on Windows.
P/s 2: I read a few old threads on the forum and people suggested that I can boot into Ubuntu to start the backup. Is there any different than using Windows to backup data?
Click to expand...
Using another OS like Ubuntu is usually only necessary if you need to copy locked system files, or if it's an OS drive and has a virus infection. Since this is not an OS drive, it'll be easier just to copy the files under Windows.

But one of the attractions of doing it with Linux is that Unix has more robust tools for copying/verifying large numbers of files. rsync and tar have been used for close to 50 years and are pretty much bug-free. There's also dd if you need to create a drive image (copy raw sectors off the drive). So when you encounter problems copying data with Windows, sometimes you're able to do it with Linux.
 
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