Hard Drive Failing

[Zosimus]

I don't know how old my computer is, exactly, but I'm guessing it's about 5 years old. Recently I've been having an increasing number of problems with the hard drive.

Often while writing the error message will come with failed CRC on write. Other times the system will not boot as it says the C drive isn't a system disk. I'm running XP and it keeps reverting to PIO access. I've tried running chkdsk /f /r, but that hasn't alleviated the problems.

Another factor is that the inside of the case is quiet dusty. I cracked it open to take a look and brushed some of the gunk out, but that hasn't helped.

So I was thinking of running Spinrite (Spinwrite?), but in my heart of hearts I know I want a new, bigger HD.

I believe the HD is partitioned into a C and a D drive. How can I tell exactly how big the combined space is? How can I move the information from one drive to the other? Will it be possible to use the current drive as a D (or E) drive and maybe rehabilitate it? How can I know?

Any advice would be appreciated.


P.S. I'm in Peru not in the US, so don't say: Run down to Fry's / BestBuy / Someplace else.

 

[RCoon]

Install crystal disk info and run it to see what the smart data is. It will advise you on any prefailures and whether you need to replace it. A broken drive is a broken drive, if it's failing all you can do is replace it.

Open up your case and look at the hard drive. It will tell you what it's capacity is. Alternatively go to disk management,
and it will tell you what the disk size is.
Also XP is not safe anymore. Look into replacing your OS.

@SuperSoph_WD can provide the gritty details and advise you on anything else.

 

[Zosimus]

 

[steen]

You have many re-allocated sectors, but there are also 31 current pending sectors that are reading bad and the hard drive is unable to re-allocate with spare ones automatically. There is no simple non data destructive method to correct this. Chkdsk /x /r will not soft map around the problem. You should back up or image your entire drive if you wish to keep the OS & data partitions, then run Seagate Seatools & re-zero the entire drive. This will destroy all the partitions & data, but will allow the bad sectors to be re-mapped & errors cleared. Also run a long test afterwards. Your drive has logged almost 25k hours, so it's getting to the bit of the bell curve where failures are more likely. I'd look to replace the drive & use it (after being rezeroed & verified) only for non-important data. If this sounds extreme, you can try the quick/long test without re-zeroing & see if it fixes the errors. Check your SATA data & power cables to the drive. It should be in SATA 300 mode not SATA 150, so also check if the drive has a SATA limiting jumper in place.