Re: WDC cavier - bad sectors

Bitstring <MPG.1d4c5acaa54038a98aee1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, from the wonderful person Rob Morley <nospam@xxxxxxxxxxxx> said 
In article <1122066436.2b5d84db4debea986c07c507f6af82aa@teranews>,
"hugh pearce" hughxxxremovexxxxwpearce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx says...

Hi

XP ran chkdsk on my Western Digital  250GB SATA drive on boot and reported
some bad sectors (4?).
I have downloaded the WD lifeguard diagnostic program and this to reports
bad sectors too and gives option to repair them.

Question is can I return this as faulty to WD as its waranted till 2007

Also is it advisable to do repair and see how drive fares, will this affect
its warantee

Most drives ship with bad sectors - the platters aren't perfect when
they're manufactured, and the bad sectors are simply mapped to spare
sectors so you don't see them.  I'd repair the disk and watch it
carefully - you've plenty of time to return it under warranty if more
faults develop.

But, as you say, those bad sectors cannot be seen by the OS because the firmware on the drive maps them out someplace else (you can usually hear the heads moving to the end of the disc when you access a bad cluster).

If you are =seeing= bad clusters in Chkdsk then either the disk has run out of redundancy it can use to repair itself, or else it is badly screwed some other way. It will get worse. It will eventually fail. Personally I'd make sure it failed real soon now, and then send it back.

--
GSV   Three Minds in a Can
Contact recommends the use of Firefox; SC recommends it at gunpoint.
.

Relevant Pages

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    (uk.comp.homebuilt)
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  • Re: WDC cavier - bad sectors
    ... >>> I have downloaded the WD lifeguard diagnostic program and this to reports ... >>> bad sectors too and gives option to repair them. ... >>Most drives ship with bad sectors - the platters aren't perfect when ...
    (uk.comp.homebuilt)