Question

Does this mean my hard drive failed?

Asked by: kab1973

Hi,

I fired up my computer recently and I get this message on the screen (see attachment).

"Primary Master Hard Disk S.M.A.R.T. Status Bad.
WARNING: Immediate back-up your data and replace
your hard disk drive. A failure may be imminent.

Press F1 to continue, DEL to enter SETUP"

I've tried loading in Secure Mode, followed through with all the suggestions offered by Windows XP and it still loads to this page. Does this mean my hard drive is shot. Or is
there a way for me to get my computer working again?

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Asked On
2009-07-05 at 16:41:23ID24545308
Tags

Microsoft Windows XP Media Edition

,

Windows PC

Topics

Windows XP Operating System

,

Computer Hard Drives

Participating Experts
5
Points
500
Comments
7

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Answers

 

by: leewPosted on 2009-07-05 at 16:45:59ID: 24781715

Your hard drive has NOT failed... YET.  However, SMART (Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M.A.R.T.) has detected that aspects of the drive are not performing as they should and when they don't failure is GENERALLY imminent.   At this point, you should backup your data and REPLACE the hard drive.  (Hard Drives are now DIRT cheap - you can replace your 160 GB drive with a 1 TB drive for $100... or $50 for a drive about 2x the size of your existing drive).

 

by: JeremySBrownPosted on 2009-07-05 at 16:52:07ID: 24781730

Have you tried running any hard drive utilities to make sure that the hard drive isn't bad? Get the UBCD and run some of the hard drive Diagnostic Tools...to make sure...try taking the hard drive out and putting it into another computer...see if you get the same results...if you get the same results most likely you have a bad hard drive...http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

 

by: garycasePosted on 2009-07-05 at 17:20:39ID: 24781791

LISTEN to what the drive's S.M.A.R.T. system is telling you -- "... A failure may be imminent ..."

As leew said, REPLACE the drive NOW !! There's no "most likely" about it -- the drive is failing and should not be used.

leew apparently didn't notice that the WD1600BB-22FTA0 is an IDE drive ==> unless your system also has SATA channels you won't be able to get a 1TB drive ... but you CAN get a 500GB IDE drive to replace it with for $72.99 [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136111 ] ... or another 160GB drive for only $44.99 [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136112 ]

It may already be too late -- you implied (but didn't say) that you can still boot to Windows ... is that correct? ["... followed through with all the suggestions offered by Windows XP ..." implies you can boot to XP.]

If you CAN boot to XP, back up any data you don't want to lose NOW.    If you can NOT boot to XP, then STOP!!  Don't do anything else with that drive until you have a new drive and the system's set up and working.    THEN you can attach the old drive as a slave -- either on a secondary IDE channel or with an external USB bridging device -- and attempt to recover your data from it.

 

by: JeremySBrownPosted on 2009-07-05 at 18:01:03ID: 24781882

I totally agree with leew...as I should of said in my last post...replace the drive...I also agree with garycase...make sure that when you buy a new hard drive...that you get the correct hard drive that supports your motherboard...SATA or IDE...if you can't boot to XP to backup all of your data...try putting it into another computer as slave and see if you can access your data that way...

 

by: nobusPosted on 2009-07-06 at 00:14:11ID: 24783158

and the WDC diag from the ubcd should tell you it's status  !

 

by: NetRolller3DPosted on 2009-07-06 at 12:23:46ID: 24788383

1. Get a new drive and install it next to your current drive.
2. Copy all data to the new drive (preferably sector-based - you can find the "dd" utility on any Linux drive CD, that will do it; there are GUI-based alternatives as well).
3. Remove the old drive and put your new drive in its place.
4. Don't pollute your environment, send the old HDD to your nearest recycling center. That's the best you can do with it.

 

by: kab1973Posted on 2009-08-01 at 14:32:58ID: 31599978

Thanks for the solution. Know I'm a little late on assigning points. Was my first question asked here. I ended up taking out the drive as I can't boot to Windows. Will try to recover the data at a later date.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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