Interpreting CrystalDisk warnings

[dg27]

One of my systems has a 2 TB WD Black internal desktop storage drive that seems fine in terms of performance. I periodically check all of my drives using Speccy, CrystalDisk, and HDTune and today I noticed something weird.

I'm wondering why CrystalDisk would flag the health of a drive with a warning (the yellow "Caution" flag in the health status area) for the same readings that both Speccy and HDTune regard as "Good" and "OK."

Is CrystalDisk overly cautious?

Interestingly, I have another, much newer WD Black drive in the same system. The readings for that one are the same as those for the drive mentioned above, yet in this case it rates a blue "Good" rating from CrystalDisk.

Can anyone shed any light on this?

 

[ss202sl]

Backup the drive regularly. When or if it fails, you'll be prepared.

 

[techgeek]

Can you take a screenshot of Crystal Disk Info, there should be one or more of the SMART parameters that have exceeded the nominal value. With a screenshot, I can tell you what it's warning about and whether it's serious or not. Make sure to grow the window vertically so I can see all the Attributes.

 

[dg27]

Backup the drive regularly. When or if it fails, you'll be prepared.

Thanks for your reply. The data is backed up redundantly, to one location every day.

I'm just curious as to the difference interpretations of the same values by Speccy, CrystalDisk, and HDTune

 

[dg27]

Can you take a screenshot of Crystal Disk Info, there should be one or more of the SMART parameters that have exceeded the nominal value. With a screenshot, I can tell you what it's warning about and whether it's serious or not. Make sure to grow the window vertically so I can see all the Attributes.

I have screens shots of Speccy, CrystalDisk, and HDTune, but it seems I can only post images from a URL? I was sure I'd posted images here via upload.

 

[techgeek]

Can you take a screenshot of Crystal Disk Info, there should be one or more of the SMART parameters that have exceeded the nominal value. With a screenshot, I can tell you what it's warning about and whether it's serious or not. Make sure to grow the window vertically so I can see all the Attributes.

I have screens shots of Speccy, CrystalDisk, and HDTune, but it seems I can only post images from a URL? I was sure I'd posted images here via upload.

No upload option, I use Photobucket, but there are many options including OneDrive.

 

[SkyNetRising]

Put those screenshots on tinypic.com and post links.

 

[dg27]

Can you take a screenshot of Crystal Disk Info, there should be one or more of the SMART parameters that have exceeded the nominal value. With a screenshot, I can tell you what it's warning about and whether it's serious or not. Make sure to grow the window vertically so I can see all the Attributes.

I have screens shots of Speccy, CrystalDisk, and HDTune, but it seems I can only post images from a URL? I was sure I'd posted images here via upload.

No upload option, I use Photobucket, but there are many options including OneDrive.

Here they are:

 

[techgeek]

OK well Current Pending Sector Count is a count of how many sectors the drive suspects of being bad and has marked to possibly re-allocate. In your case you only have 6 (in decimal and hex) which isn't very many. So those 6 sectors have become unstable and the reason they haven't been re-allocated yet is that the data can't be read from them. Once the drive is able to read the data, it will re-allocate the data to a new location and then that number will be decreased. However once remapped those 6 sectors will show up in the Reallocated attribute.

Now I've seen drives that have reallocated sectors that last for years without another problem. However you should always take this situation seriously. The drive is no longer 100% reliable. This issue could cascade quickly and cause data loss. As you've mentioned, you have back ups. It's entirely up to you whether you want to trust that this situation will not get worse. However it couldn't hurt to contact the manufacturer if it's still under warranty.

 

[SkyNetRising]

There are 6 pending sectors - drive was unable to read those previously.
They need to be overwritten to resolve pending status.
After that pending status gets cleared and depending on result relocated sector count increases or not.

 

[dg27]

OK well Current Pending Sector Count is a count of how many sectors the drive suspects of being bad and has marked to possibly re-allocate. In your case you only have 6 (in decimal and hex) which isn't very many. So those 6 sectors have become unstable and the reason they haven't been re-allocated yet is that the data can't be read from them. Once the drive is able to read the data, it will re-allocate the data to a new location and then that number will be decreased. However once remapped those 6 sectors will show up in the Reallocated attribute.

Now I've seen drives that have reallocated sectors that last for years without another problem. However you should always take this situation seriously. The drive is no longer 100% reliable. This issue could cascade quickly and cause data loss. As you've mentioned, you have back ups. It's entirely up to you whether you want to trust that this situation will not get worse. However it couldn't hurt to contact the manufacturer if it's still under warranty.

Thanks to all who replied.

This is helpful: Now I know that the current pending sector count is the one to watch.
This one isn't under warranty; I think for now I'll just monitor it. It's a secondary storage drive, meaning it's not used as much, but I still back it up every day.

Thanks again!

 

[techgeek]

Well it's also good to keep an eye on Reallocated Sectors as well as Reallocation Event Count, these will hopefully be the same. If the Reallocated Event Count is higher, it means that when the drive attempted to move data, some of the attempts were unsuccessful which resulted in additional attempts.

 

[dg27]

Well it's also good to keep an eye on Reallocated Sectors as well as Reallocation Event Count, these will hopefully be the same. If the Reallocated Event Count is higher, it means that when the drive attempted to move data, some of the attempts were unsuccessful which resulted in additional attempts.

Thanks for the tip!