See:
http://cid-2e572770a3a5cd55.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/hdtune.GIF

Previously I've looked only for "Reallocated Sector Count" but there are 
large values on this disk for Raw Read Error rate, Seek Error rate and 
Hardware ECC Recovered.

Looks nasty.  Junk?

Phil, London

In message <Wmlum.148422$hv7.89390@newsfe10.ams2>, Philip Herlihy 
<me@here.localhost> writes
>See:
>http://cid-2e572770a3a5cd55.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/hdtune.GIF
>
>Previously I've looked only for "Reallocated Sector Count" but there 
>are large values on this disk for Raw Read Error rate, Seek Error rate 
>and Hardware ECC Recovered.
>
>Looks nasty.  Junk?

I can't see anything wrong with that. What other symptoms is it showing?

I've seen values like that on many many drives, I think the software 
isn't interpreting them correctly.
-- 
Chris

Chris wrote:
> In message <Wmlum.148422$hv7.89390@newsfe10.ams2>, Philip Herlihy 
> <me@here.localhost> writes
>> See:
>> http://cid-2e572770a3a5cd55.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/hdtune.GIF
>>
>> Previously I've looked only for "Reallocated Sector Count" but there 
>> are large values on this disk for Raw Read Error rate, Seek Error rate 
>> and Hardware ECC Recovered.
>>
>> Looks nasty.  Junk?
> 
> I can't see anything wrong with that. What other symptoms is it showing?
> 
> I've seen values like that on many many drives, I think the software 
> isn't interpreting them correctly.

Thanks for the reply.  I've just cleared a zillion virus files off it, 
and at one point it was reportedly refusing to boot, although I haven't 
seen this.  It did seem to "lose" a new user profile I created, and it 
seems rather slow for the processor and memory it has.  The machine I'm 
using now (disk is about a month old) has values of 0 for Raw Read Error 
Rate, and Seek Error rate, and doesn't display a value for Hardware ECC 
Recovered.  I don't remember noticing high values for any of these 
indicators before.

Phil

On Wed, 23 Sep 2009 11:49:08 +0100, Philip Herlihy wrote:

> Chris wrote:
>> In message <Wmlum.148422$hv7.89390@newsfe10.ams2>, Philip Herlihy
>> <me@here.localhost> writes
>>> See:
>>> http://cid-2e572770a3a5cd55.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/
hdtune.GIF
>>>
>>> Previously I've looked only for "Reallocated Sector Count" but there
>>> are large values on this disk for Raw Read Error rate, Seek Error rate
>>> and Hardware ECC Recovered.
>>>
>>> Looks nasty.  Junk?
>> 
>> I can't see anything wrong with that. What other symptoms is it
>> showing?
>> 
>> I've seen values like that on many many drives, I think the software
>> isn't interpreting them correctly.
> 
> Thanks for the reply.  I've just cleared a zillion virus files off it,
> and at one point it was reportedly refusing to boot, although I haven't
> seen this.  It did seem to "lose" a new user profile I created, and it
> seems rather slow for the processor and memory it has.  The machine I'm
> using now (disk is about a month old) has values of 0 for Raw Read Error
> Rate, and Seek Error rate, and doesn't display a value for Hardware ECC
> Recovered.  I don't remember noticing high values for any of these
> indicators before.
> 
> Phil

The advice I use is

"If the RAW figure for Reallocated Sector Count, Current Pending Sector 
Count, or Reallocation Event Count is higher than zero, then the drive 
is throwing up bad sectors. Replace it."

On my linux machine the smart info looks horrible but those values are 
zero so perhaps all is ok.

-- 
rich

rich wrote:
> On Wed, 23 Sep 2009 11:49:08 +0100, Philip Herlihy wrote:
> 
>> Chris wrote:
>>> In message <Wmlum.148422$hv7.89390@newsfe10.ams2>, Philip Herlihy
>>> <me@here.localhost> writes
>>>> See:
>>>> http://cid-2e572770a3a5cd55.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/
> hdtune.GIF
>>>> Previously I've looked only for "Reallocated Sector Count" but there
>>>> are large values on this disk for Raw Read Error rate, Seek Error rate
>>>> and Hardware ECC Recovered.
>>>>
>>>> Looks nasty.  Junk?
>>> I can't see anything wrong with that. What other symptoms is it
>>> showing?
>>>
>>> I've seen values like that on many many drives, I think the software
>>> isn't interpreting them correctly.
>> Thanks for the reply.  I've just cleared a zillion virus files off it,
>> and at one point it was reportedly refusing to boot, although I haven't
>> seen this.  It did seem to "lose" a new user profile I created, and it
>> seems rather slow for the processor and memory it has.  The machine I'm
>> using now (disk is about a month old) has values of 0 for Raw Read Error
>> Rate, and Seek Error rate, and doesn't display a value for Hardware ECC
>> Recovered.  I don't remember noticing high values for any of these
>> indicators before.
>>
>> Phil
> 
> The advice I use is
> 
> "If the RAW figure for Reallocated Sector Count, Current Pending Sector 
> Count, or Reallocation Event Count is higher than zero, then the drive 
> is throwing up bad sectors. Replace it."
> 
> On my linux machine the smart info looks horrible but those values are 
> zero so perhaps all is ok.
> 

I'll work on that basis for now.  The machine's a bit screwed, but a 
surface scan with HDtune showed no errors, and it passes memtest.  I 
suspect there is virus damage.  Windows Update wants to reapply SP3, so 
(after an image) I'll let it do that, and see how I get on.  Thanks for 
the note.  Those are scary figures, though!

Phil

Philip Herlihy wrote:
> See:
> http://cid-2e572770a3a5cd55.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/hdtune.GIF
> 
> Previously I've looked only for "Reallocated Sector Count" but there are 
> large values on this disk for Raw Read Error rate, Seek Error rate and 
> Hardware ECC Recovered.
> 
> Looks nasty.  Junk?

I see no reason to think so.

As far as I know, there is no standard for the meaning of the "raw" 
SMART attribute values (the Data column) (but see the next paragraph). 
The drive will have some method of "normalising" the raw value - 
computing the computed values seen in the Current and Worst columns, and 
SMART status is based on comparison between the normalised values and 
threshold.

For some attributes, there's really only one sensible thing for the raw 
value to represent - such as temperature (although the units may vary) 
and attributes that are lifetime event counters (like reallocated sector 
count and power on hours).

As a pure guess, the attributes you mention may be some kind of 
periodically updated, exponentially decaying fixed/floating point value.

Alex

Philip Herlihy wrote:
> See:
> http://cid-2e572770a3a5cd55.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/hdtune.GIF
> 
> Previously I've looked only for "Reallocated Sector Count" but there are 
> large values on this disk for Raw Read Error rate, Seek Error rate and 
> Hardware ECC Recovered.

Those parameters are manufacturer-dependent, and the values there appear 
normal for a Seagate drive.

One of the few human-useful parameters apart from the sector counts is 
"Ultra DMA CRC Error Count". If this is anything except zero, you've 
generally got cable problems.


-- 
John Jordan