Understanding SMART?

[_WW_]

Been having some trouble on bootup. SMART is giving me a warning about HDD failure being imminent. Both rives are WD400BB. After several trys at restarting, I entered setup and discovered that SMART was Disabled. So why did it warn me if it was disabled?

Anyway, I enabled it and exited BIOS, Windows then started.

Here is the information from AIDA32 on the C: drive which has the OS.:

01 Raw Read Error Rate Threshold=51 Value=1 Worst=1 Data=419 Pre-Failure: Imminent loss of data is being predicted.

Here is the data from the D: drive without problems:

01 Raw Read Error Rate Threshold=51 Value=200 Worst=200 Data=0 OK: Value is normal

The machine has been up and running for about an hour and in fact I am using it to get online and post this. As near as I can tell so far everything is working but I have yet to run any real tests. Oh yea, the drive is 13 months old..heh heh..

Is is just a couple of bad sectors that I can work around or should I panic and install a new one?

....WW

 

[HammerBot]

Perhaps your BIOS simply ignores the enable/disable feature of the SMART status. There is really no reason not to enable it.

Regarding your bad sectors. Bad sectors are generally bad, especially if they just sudden appear. They tend to 'multiply'. You may never get another bad sector again, but you may also get a lot more.

I would backup all data and RMA the drive. If one bad sectors isn't enough reason to RMA the drive (or WD won't accept it), atleast keep your valuable data on the good drive.


<i><b>Engineering is the fine art of making what you want from things you can get</b></i>

 

[_WW_]

Just went through the RMA at WD. Lucky for me the warranty is good until Feb. 9..heh heh..talk about a close one! While running the their diagnostic tool it generated the error code that simply offered "Replace Disk" as the next step, so it should be a pretty cut-and-dried RMA.

....WW

 

[HammerBot]

Didn't you say that the the drive was 13 months old? I never heard of a warranty period of 14-15 months!
Anyway, just RMA the drive!

<i><b>Engineering is the fine art of making what you want from things you can get</b></i>

 

[JP5]

I've seen reviews that show a 5%-10% performance hit with SMART

 

[HammerBot]

I cannot believe that. SMART is nothing more but 'Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology'. It does nothing more than report potential problems. Please provide a link to those reviews!

<i><b>Engineering is the fine art of making what you want from things you can get</b></i>

 

[_WW_]

According to my records, I ordered the drive from newegg on Jan. 2, 2003. When I went to newegg to do the RMA I was told the warranty had expired and to contact WD. Going to the WD site and entering the serial number of the drive into their online RMA program the expiration date came back as Feb. 9, 2004.

At this point the last thing I want to do is question their records..heh heh..

About the SMART, if the Bios doesn't care if it is disabled or not, why is there an option to turn it on and off? Could this latest BIOS revision be faulty?

mobo ASUS P4PE
BIOS rev. 1007.awd
P4 2.66
1024 DDRAM
XP Pro w/SP1

....WW

 

[HammerBot]

Don't care about it. Just leave it enabled.

<i><b>Engineering is the fine art of making what you want from things you can get</b></i>