are they safe to use ?

amitkool21

Honorable
Jan 19, 2013
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Hello,

Recently i received 3 new Hard Drive replacements from SeaGate , they are 2x2TB GoFlex Desk External Drive and other one is 1TB GoFlex Ultra-portable Drive

I checked them with Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows for any kind of bad sectors by using write zero feature, but the thing is i tried the quick method before using the full one as i had in my mind that it'll show me bad sectors because drives are from some other brand and guess what i was write , it showed me bad sectors on all 3 drives on the both 2 TB it showed me bad sectors on the exact same sectors and on the 1TB it showed me on half number of bad sector as shown in the 2TB one.

So what i want to know is are these drives safe to start taking my backups or should i test them first with some other software ?

I have used Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows earlier too for Wested Digital Drives and it showed me bad sectors on a couple of them and on some it completed the process without any error , so i know that the software is good but what about it with other brands drives ?

P.S. : If there is a more better tool available for this purpose on OS X(Mountain Lion) than i can use that too :)

Thank You.
 
Solution
You can try "CrystalDiskInfo" and also "HDTune" and check the hard disks. Pay particular attention to "Re-allocated sector count - Raw values"

I do not recommend using hard disks with any bad sectors.


thanx for the reply man.

i looked with "CrystalDiskInfo" and "Re-allocated sector count - Raw values" are 00000000000

so if the disk has a bad sector the CrystalDiskInfo will automatically detect it ?

I'm trying the HD-Tune pro too and using the "Erase-Zero fill " option in that , is that oaky or should i choose some other option to check the bad sectors in HD-Tune ?
 
You used Data Lifeguard from WD to do tests on drives from Seagate! You should realize that these diagnostics are custom-tweaked for drives made by the supplier of the diagnostic suite. It is possible that your tests gave you faulty results.

Go to the Seagate website and download / install THEIR diagnostic package, Seatools. Get the "for DOS" version as an .iso image you must burn to a CDR. You BOOT from this CD and run the tests on the disks from the menu. If the LONG test on each new Seagate HDD says you have not problems, you're golden. The tools also include a zero-fill utility, but that takes a long time - just as ling as the Long Test. So decide which you want to run on the HDD's.
 


yeah i have heard about the Seatools for DOS but have never used them, they should add that write zero feature in the GUI version of Seatools for windows bcoz that full write zero method takes a long time to scan the discs and computer is unusable for that time.

BTW i have done the Erase-Write Zero with HD Tune Pro now.......Error Scan now and after that i'll do the Health Check, i'm really not interested in Seatools for DOS 🙁

later i will update here the results of HD Tune Pro
 
ok i tested all the 3 drives with HD-Tune Pro 5 and all of them are Normal that means no error.

i used the write zero method and Error scan both thats why it tok this long.

thanx guys for your valuable suggestions.