Chkdsk - Interpreting Results?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Whit
  • Start date Start date
W

Whit

Following a response to an earlier "I've gotta problem" post - thanks,
Bruce - I ran chkdsk /f. I received a long string of "File record segment
XXXX is unreadable". Although I lost some data, it seemed to fix the
immediate problem. I reran chkdsk and it once again reported a long list of
unreadable segments. I'm not sure how to interpret this. Is my hard drive
dying? What's the next step? Thanks very much for your help.
Whit
 
Whit said:
Following a response to an earlier "I've gotta problem" post - thanks,
Bruce - I ran chkdsk /f. I received a long string of "File record segment
XXXX is unreadable". Although I lost some data, it seemed to fix the
immediate problem. I reran chkdsk and it once again reported a long list
of unreadable segments. I'm not sure how to interpret this. Is my hard
drive dying? What's the next step? Thanks very much for your help.
Whit
Click to expand...

Yes, those are the symptoms of a dying hard drive. If you have valuable
data on the drive, get it off as soon as possible. Hard drives are pretty
cheap right now, and will come with a utility to clone the existing drive,
which may or may not work with the bad drive, but worth a try. The more
you use the drive before then, the worse it is going to get.
 
Thanks, guys. Hoped for a different answer, but at least I can still get
most of my data. As always, I appreciate the great help this ng offers.
Whit
 
Whit said:
Following a response to an earlier "I've gotta problem" post - thanks,
Bruce - I ran chkdsk /f. I received a long string of "File record segment
XXXX is unreadable". Although I lost some data, it seemed to fix the
immediate problem. I reran chkdsk and it once again reported a long listof
unreadable segments. I'm not sure how to interpret this. Is my hard drive
dying?
Click to expand...


Possibly. It is certainly time to ensure all your data is safely backed
up. Then do a run of CHKDSK with the /R option. That will identify bad
sectors, attempt to retrieve their content and then (I think) mark the
sectors as not to be used. If after that you start getting more bad
sector reports, it is time for a replacement.

If your BIOS has an ability to monitor 'S.M.A.RT' on the hard drive,
turn it on. Then get the free Aida 32, enterprise edition from
http://www.aida32.hu/aida-download.php?bit=32
and check on the drive at Storage - SMART. If SMART is saying the drive
is on the way out, take it seriously - that is the drive itself calling
for something to be done
 
Back
Top