How accurate is Hard Disk Sentinel¿

[Deku Midoriya]

I was fully aware that my hard drive was dying, but I wanted to know how long I had left because the computer doesn't work with new hard drives. So I find this program and it tells me I have 0 days left, obviously that's not right. But how close is it¿
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B6g60XEL_jitRFhmWXBxVk9MNk0

 

[getochkn]

There is no true prediction. When it's dead, you'll know it's time is up. lol. It could be tonight, could be 5 years, though probably not.

 

[RolandJS]

One time on a Pentium III MMX, one of two HDs sent a SMART alert, I immediately made backups in less than two hours, then, afterwards, the HD imploded in about 15 minutes. I have HD Sentinal on my three computers; I just realized that without a second such program running at the same time, I have no way to discern its accuracy.

 

[ArtPog]

By & large, getochkn is correct in that it's virtually impossible to predict with any precision when a disk will fail.

Having said that...

We've used the HD Sentinel program for many, many years. It's just about our favorite HDD drive diagnostic program in terms of providing solid info on the state of health of a drive. When the program indicates imminent failure of a disk (as it does in your case), we pay attention.

Assuming the data on the disk is of some importance to you, back it up A/S/A/P. Frankly, I would trash the disk.

Your statement that your computer "doesn't work with new hard drives" is ominous. If that IS the case something is fundamentally wrong with your system and must be "fixed".

 

[getochkn]

By & large, getochkn is correct in that it's virtually impossible to predict with any precision when a disk will fail.

Having said that...

We've used the HD Sentinel program for many, many years. It's just about our favorite HDD drive diagnostic program in terms of providing solid info on the state of health of a drive. When the program indicates imminent failure of a disk (as it does in your case), we pay attention.

Assuming the data on the disk is of some importance to you, back it up A/S/A/P. Frankly, I would trash the disk.

Your statement that your computer "doesn't work with new hard drives" is ominous. If that IS the case something is fundamentally wrong with your system and must be "fixed".

Unless it is a older system that uses IDE drives, still, and thus, doesn't work with new SATA drives. That could be what they mean.

 

[ArtPog]

By & large, getochkn is correct in that it's virtually impossible to predict with any precision when a disk will fail.

Having said that...

We've used the HD Sentinel program for many, many years. It's just about our favorite HDD drive diagnostic program in terms of providing solid info on the state of health of a drive. When the program indicates imminent failure of a disk (as it does in your case), we pay attention.

Assuming the data on the disk is of some importance to you, back it up A/S/A/P. Frankly, I would trash the disk.

Your statement that your computer "doesn't work with new hard drives" is ominous. If that IS the case something is fundamentally wrong with your system and must be "fixed".

Unless it is a older system that uses IDE drives, still, and thus, doesn't work with new SATA drives. That could be what they mean.

That's very doubtful. The drive in question is one of Hitachi's lesser quality 2.5" SATA notebook drives. I think it's about 3 or 4 yrs old. It's probably just seen its days. I suppose as long as the OP isn't particularly concerned with the disk's data he/she can continue to use it until it gives up the ghost.

 

[Deku Midoriya]

By & large, getochkn is correct in that it's virtually impossible to predict with any precision when a disk will fail.

Having said that...

We've used the HD Sentinel program for many, many years. It's just about our favorite HDD drive diagnostic program in terms of providing solid info on the state of health of a drive. When the program indicates imminent failure of a disk (as it does in your case), we pay attention.

Assuming the data on the disk is of some importance to you, back it up A/S/A/P. Frankly, I would trash the disk.

Your statement that your computer "doesn't work with new hard drives" is ominous. If that IS the case something is fundamentally wrong with your system and must be "fixed".

Very little of it is important, and what is I have on a flash drive. I've been trying to figure out why it won't work with other drives but it seems to defy logic. The computer gets no power when another hard drive is installed. Just a quick flash of the power light and then nothing. I thought it was the new drive but I got another one and the same thing happened. I can only find a few other instances of this on the web and none were solved. I'm going to try getting a new version of the same drive that's dying but if that doesn't work i'll just have to move on. Also, the computer is only a year old so i guess at some point i broke a mirror while walking under a ladder.

 

[ArtPog]

It certainly appears that the problem(s) you're experiencing go far beyond a defective drive. I'm not sure I quite understand your statement that "The computer gets no power when another hard drive is installed. Just a quick flash of the power light and then nothing."

Are you (in effect) indicating that when you power-up the PC a LED blinks and then the PC immediately shuts down? So you're left with a black screen? And this situation happens sometimes, but not all the time?

Are you working with a laptop or is this a desktop PC? Have you given consideration to a defective PSU?

 

[Deku Midoriya]

It certainly appears that the problem(s) you're experiencing go far beyond a defective drive. I'm not sure I quite understand your statement that "The computer gets no power when another hard drive is installed. Just a quick flash of the power light and then nothing."

Are you (in effect) indicating that when you power-up the PC a LED blinks and then the PC immediately shuts down? So you're left with a black screen? And this situation happens sometimes, but not all the time?

Are you working with a laptop or is this a desktop PC? Have you given consideration to a defective PSU?

This is a laptop. Yes, when I try to turn the computer on the led indicating power blinks and then nothing happens. No fans or drive spinning up either. After that the led won't even blink upon pressing the power button unless I remove the battery, wait a few seconds and put it back in. This only happens with the new hard drive, putting in the old one that's failing results in a normal boot. I checked the power draw on both hard drives and its the same. Is there any way the power brick could cause this? Also, thanks for helping. I've asked about this multiple times, but you're the first one to try to help.

 

[ArtPog]

Well, if there's no power-type problem when the "old" HDD is installed in that the system boots to the OS and functions without problems, that would seem to rule out any problem with the PSU.

When you say the problem arises with a "new" HDD, what precisely are you referring to? Is this a HDD that contains an installed OS that you previously created? What do you mean by "new"?

Obviously if it's a "virgin" disk you don't have a "system" until you've installed an OS onto the disk. And you've indicated this problem has occurred with two new HDDs so that would seem to rule out any problem with defective disks. But surely you know this. So I'm somewhat perplexed about exactly what's the situation here.

 

[Deku Midoriya]

Well, if there's no power-type problem when the "old" HDD is installed in that the system boots to the OS and functions without problems, that would seem to rule out any problem with the PSU.

When you say the problem arises with a "new" HDD, what precisely are you referring to? Is this a HDD that contains an installed OS that you previously created? What do you mean by "new"?

Obviously if it's a "virgin" disk you don't have a "system" until you've installed an OS onto the disk. And you've indicated this problem has occurred with two new HDDs so that would seem to rule out any problem with defective disks. But surely you know this. So I'm somewhat perplexed about exactly what's the situation here.

A new HDD in this situation means a freshly out of the box drive with no OS installed. I have windows 10 on a flash drive that I was going to install on it, but obviously, I never made it that far. Like I mentioned earlier, this seems to defy logic. Maybe entities from a 20th dimension messed with my laptop? I should also mention that i've only found a few other posts about this exact problem, and 2 of them were my exact laptop. So yeah. Fml.

 

[ArtPog]

1. I assume your laptop - like most laptops - is equipped with a single HDD/SSD bay to accommodate a single HDD or SSD.
2. So now you install a new ("virgin") HDD with the need to install the Win 10 OS onto that drive.
3. You connect the Windows Media Tool (flash drive) containing the Win 10 setup files to one of your USB ports.
4. You power-up the PC. Presumably the system should boot to the flash drive and access the Win 10 Setup.
5. In many cases the system will boot directly to the WMT without user intervention, however if it doesn't, your laptop will have the capability of booting to that device via a "boot menu" which you access by pressing the appropriate key during the beginning of the bootup process. The appropriate key differs from laptop to laptop.
6. All the preceding is basic stuff which I assume you know.

So I'm at a loss to determine precisely what is happening to cause the problem(s) you've encountered.
Would another creation of the WMT be in order?

 

[Deku Midoriya]

1. I assume your laptop - like most laptops - is equipped with a single HDD/SSD bay to accommodate a single HDD or SSD.
2. So now you install a new ("virgin") HDD with the need to install the Win 10 OS onto that drive.
3. You connect the Windows Media Tool (flash drive) containing the Win 10 setup files to one of your USB ports.
4. You power-up the PC. Presumably the system should boot to the flash drive and access the Win 10 Setup.
5. In many cases the system will boot directly to the WMT without user intervention, however if it doesn't, your laptop will have the capability of booting to that device via a "boot menu" which you access by pressing the appropriate key during the beginning of the bootup process. The appropriate key differs from laptop to laptop.
6. All the preceding is basic stuff which I assume you know.

So I'm at a loss to determine precisely what is happening to cause the problem(s) you've encountered.
Would another creation of the WMT be in order?

I think the situation has gotten too confusing. Thank you for trying to help, but I think it's time to give up. If you're interested i'll let you know if i'm able to fix it, since its such a strange issue. Good day to you, Sir.