Hard Drive Testing???

[scooter69]

OK, I've always used IBM-Hitachi disk diagnostics or WD Life Guard Tools to test HDD and they've been reliable. I recently picked up a couple of "White Label" drives and they fail every test I run (IBM, Hitachi, Maxtor, WD Life Tools, and other name brand tests. They all say incompatible or bad sectors, but running a non-brand specific test for bad sectors/surface scan and all show good with no bad sectors. So what should I believe?.

PS. Seatools did come up with a "Pass" on the short and long test, but that was the only one.
Thanks

 

[Darkbreeze]

Seatools for windows and dos are the most reliable ones in my opinion when using on different or non-branded drives. If Seatools passes them on the long generic and the short DST, they should be fine.

Seatools is also usually the number one listed hard drive diagnostic utility on every compiled IT toolbox.

 

[fzabkar]

IMHO the best diagnostic is an MHDD surface scan in real DOS mode. MHDD will tell you if there are any "slow" sectors. Most other diagnostics, especially the HDD manufacturer's tools, are either pass or fail.

A SMART test with CrystalDiskInfo or HD Sentinel should tell you if there are any reallocated, pending or uncorrectable sectors.