Utilities for checking hdd. How to know the status of the hard drive: how much longer will it last. Testing hard drives: AIDA64 program.

Sooner or later (better, of course, if early), any user asks himself how long he will last computer hard   drive and it's time to look after his replacement. There is nothing surprising in this, because hard drives, due to their design features, are the least reliable among computer components. Moreover, it is on the HDD that most users store the lion's share of the most diverse information: documents, images, various software, etc., so that the unexpected failure of the disk is always a tragedy. Of course, it is not uncommon for information on externally "dead" hard drivesx can be restored, but it is possible that this operation will fly you "a pretty penny," and nerves will cost a lot. Therefore, it is much more effective to try to prevent the loss of data.
  How? Very simple ... First, do not forget about the regular backup   data, and secondly, to monitor the state of disks with the help of specialized utilities. Several programs of this plan in the foreground of the problems being solved will be considered in this article.

  Monitoring of SMART parameters and temperature

All modern HDDs and even solid state drives (SSDs) support S.M.A.R.T. technology. ( from the English.   Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology - technology of self-monitoring, analysis and reporting), which was developed by major manufacturers hard disks to increase the reliability of their products. This technology is based on continuous monitoring and evaluation of the state of the hard disk by the built-in self-diagnostic equipment (special sensors), and its main purpose is the timely detection possible exit   drive failure.

  Monitoring of HDD status in real time

A number of information diagnostic solutions for diagnostics and testing of hardware, as well as special monitoring utilities, use the technology of S.M.A.R.T. To monitor the current state of various vital parameters describing the reliability and performance of hard drives. They read the relevant parameters directly from the sensors and temperature sensors that are equipped with all modern hard disks, analyze the received data and display them in the form of a short tabular report with a list of attributes. At the same time, part of the utilities (Hard Drive Inspector, HDDlife, Crystal Disk Info, etc.) is not limited to displaying an attribute table (whose values ​​are not intelligible to unprepared users) and additionally displays a summary of the disk status in a more accessible form.

It is easy to diagnose the hard disk state with this kind of utilities. It's easy to get acquainted with the basic basic information about the installed HDD: with the basic data about the Hard Drive Inspector disks, a certain percentage of the health of the hard disk in HDDlife, the indicator "TechStatement" in Crystal Disk Info ( 1), etc. In any of these programs, the minimum information required for each of the HDDs installed on the computer is provided: data on the hard drive model, its volume, operating temperature, time worked, and the level of reliability and performance. This information makes it possible to draw certain conclusions about the performance of the media.

Fig. 1. Brief information about the "health" of the working HDD

It is necessary to configure the launch of the monitoring utility simultaneously with the start of the operating system, adjust the time interval between the S.M.A.R.T.-attribute checks, and also enable the display of the temperature and "health level" of the hard disks in the system tray. After that, to monitor the status of the disks, the user will only need to glance at the indicator in the system tray from time to time, where the brief information about the status of the drives in the system will be displayed: the level of their "health" and temperature (Figure 2). By the way, the operating temperature is not less important than the conventional HDD health indicator, because hard drives can suddenly fail due to banal overheating. Therefore, if the hard disk is heated above 50 ° C, then it would be wiser to provide it with additional cooling.

Fig. 2. Display the status of the hard drive
  in the system tray HDDlife

It should be noted that a number of such utilities provide for integration with windows Explorer, so that the icons on the local disks show a green icon in case of their serviceability, and when the problems appear the icon turns red. So you can hardly forget about the health of hard disks. With such constant monitoring, you can not miss the moment when some problems start to appear with the disk, because if the utility detects critical changes in the attributes of S.M.A.R.T. and / or temperature, it will carefully notify the user (message on the screen, sound message, etc. - Fig. 3). Thanks to this, you will have time to copy the data from the fearful carrier in advance.

Fig. 3. Example of a message to immediately replace the drive

To use the S.M.A.R.T.-monitoring solutions to monitor the state of hard disks is quite easy, because all such utilities work in the background and require a minimum of hardware resources, so their operation in no way hinders the basic workflow.

  Control of S.M.A.R.T.-attributes

Advanced users, of course, are unlikely to be limited to assessing the status of hard drives by viewing a brief verdict of one of the above utilities. It is understandable, because of the decoding of the attributes of S.M.A.R.T. It is possible to identify the cause of the faults and, if necessary, to take additional measures prudently. However, for self-control of S.M.A.R.T.-attributes, it will be necessary to at least briefly get acquainted with the technology of S.M.A.R.T.

The structure of the hard drives supporting this technology includes intelligent self-diagnostic procedures, so they are able to "report" their current state. This diagnostic information is provided as a collection of attributes, that is, specific characteristics of the hard disk used to analyze its performance and reliability.

B aboutmost of the important attributes have the same meaning for the discs of all manufacturers. The values ​​of these attributes during normal disk operation can vary in some intervals. For any parameter, the manufacturer defines a minimum safety value that can not be exceeded under normal operating conditions. It is unambiguous to determine the critically important and critically unimportant parameters for S.M.A.R.T. is problematic. Each of the attributes has its own information value and shows one or another aspect in the work of the carrier. However, in the first place, you should pay attention to the following attributes:

• Raw Read Error Rate - the frequency of errors in reading data from the disk, caused by the fault of the equipment;
• Spin Up Time - average time for spinning the disk spindle;
• Reallocated Sector Count - the number of sector reassignments;
• Seek Error Rate - frequency of occurrence of positioning errors;
• Spin Retry Count - the number of repeated attempts to untwist disks to the operating speed in case the first attempt fails;
• Current Pending Sector Count - the number of unstable sectors (that is, sectors waiting for the reassignment procedure);
• Offline Scan Uncorrectable Count - total number of uncorrected errors during sector read / write operations.

Typically, the attributes of S.M.A.R.T. are displayed in a tabular form with the name of the Attribute, its ID and three values: the current value, the minimum threshold and the lowest value of the attribute for the entire duration of the drive Worst, and the absolute value of the attribute (Raw). Each attribute has a current value, which can be any number from 1 to 100, 200 or 253 (there are no common standards for the upper bounds of attribute values). Values ​​Value and Worst in an entirely new hard drive are the same (Figure 4).

Fig. 4. Attributes of S.M.A.R.T. for a new HDD

The one shown in Fig. 4 information allows you to conclude that in a theoretically sound hard drive, the current (Value) and worst (Worst) values ​​should be as close as possible to each other, and the value of Raw for most parameters (except for the parameters: Power-On Time, HDA Temperature and some others ) should approach zero. The current value may change over time, which in most cases reflects the degradation of the hard disk parameters described by the attribute. This can be seen in Fig. 5, where fragments of the attribute table S.M.A.R.T are presented. for the same disk - the data were obtained with an interval of six months. As you can see, in a more recent version of S.M.A.R.T. Raw Read Error Rate, the origin of which is due to the hardware of the disc, and the error rate when positioning the Seek Error Rate unit, which may indicate that the hard drive is overheating and its unstable position in the basket . If the current value of an attribute approaches or becomes less than the threshold value, the hard disk is considered unreliable, and it should be changed urgently. For example, the drop in the value of the Spin-Up Time attribute (the average spin-up time of the disk) below the critical value, usually indicates a complete wear of the mechanics, so that the disc is no longer able to support the manufacturer's specified rotation speed. Therefore, it is necessary to monitor the status of the HDD and periodically (for example, every 2-3 months) to carry out diagnostics of S.M.A.R.T. and save the information received in text file. In the future, these data can be compared with the current and draw certain conclusions about the development of the situation.

Fig. 5. Table of attributes S.M.A.R.T., obtained with a half-year interval
  (more recent version of S.M.A.R.T. below)

When viewing S.M.A.R.T.-attributes, it is first of all necessary to pay attention to critical parameters, as well as to parameters that are different from the base color (more often blue or green) indicators. Depending on the current state of the attribute in the output of S.M.A.R.T. It is usually marked with a color, which makes it easier to understand the situation. In particular, in the Hard Drive Inspector program the color indicator can have a green, yellow, yellow, orange or red color - green and yellow-green colors indicate that everything is normal (the value of the attribute has not changed or changed insignificantly), and yellow, orange and red colors signal danger (the worst is the red color, which indicates that the value of the attribute has reached its critical value). If any of the critical parameters is marked with a red icon, then you need to replace the hard drive immediately.

Let's review the table of S.M.A.R.T.-attributes of the same disk in the Hard Drive Inspector program, a brief evaluation of which was presented earlier by monitoring utilities. From Fig. 6 shows that the values ​​of all attributes are normal and all parameters are marked in green. A similar picture will be shown by the utilities HDDlife and Crystal Disk Info. True, more professional solutions for HDD analysis and diagnostics are not so loyal and often label S.M.A.R.T.-attributes more meticulously. For example, such well-known utilities as HD Tune Pro and HDD Scan, in our case with suspicion reacted to the attribute UltraDMA CRC Errors, which displays the number of errors that occur when transferring information via an external interface (Figure 7). The cause of such errors is usually associated with a twisted and poor-quality SATA-loop, which, perhaps, should be replaced.

Fig. 6. Table S. MA.R.T.-attributes, obtained in the program Hard Drive Inspector

Fig. 7. Results of the assessment of the state of S.M.A.R.T.-attributes
  Utilities HD Tune Pro and HDD Scan

For comparison, we will become acquainted with S.M.A.R.T.-attributes of a very ancient but still working HDD with periodically arising problems. He did not inspire the program Crystal Disk Info trust - in the indicator "Tekosostoyanie" the state of the disk was estimated as alarming, and the attribute Reallocated Sector Count turned out to be highlighted yellow (Figure 8). This is an important attribute from the point of view of the "health" of the disk, denoting the number of sectors that are reassigned when the disk detects a read / write error, during this operation the data from the damaged sector is transferred to the spare area. The yellow color of the indicator in the parameter indicates that there are few remaining spare sectors that can be replaced by faulty ones, and soon there will be nothing to reassign the newly appearing bad sectors. Let's also check how the serious state of the disk is evaluated by more serious solutions, for example, the widely used utility HDDScan, but we see exactly the same result here (Figure 9).

Fig. 8. Evaluation of a problematic hard disk in CrystalDiskInfo

Fig. 9. Results of S.M.A.R.T.-diagnostics of HDD in HDDScan

So, with the replacement of such a hard drive, obviously you should not pull, although it can also serve for a while, though operating system you can not install this hard disk, of course. It is worth noting that in the presence of a large number of reassigned sectors, the read / write speed drops (due to unnecessary movements that the magnetic head has to do), and the disc starts to noticeably slow down.

  Surface scanning on bad sectors

Unfortunately, in practice, one control of SMART parameters and temperature is indispensable. When there is a tiny bit of evidence that something is wrong with the disk (in the case of periodic hangup of programs, for example, when saving results, the occurrence of error messages for reading, etc.), it is necessary to scan the disk surface for unreadable sectors. To carry out such a verification of the media, you can use, for example, the HD Tune Pro and HDDScan utilities or diagnostic utilities from the hard drive manufacturers, but these utilities work only with their hard drive models, and therefore we will not consider them.

When using such solutions, there is a risk of data corruption on the scanned disc. On the one hand, with the information on the disk, if the drive does turn out to be faulty, anything can happen during scanning. On the other hand, it is impossible to exclude incorrect actions on the part of the user, which accidentally starts scanning in the write mode, during which the sectoral mashing of data from the hard drive with a certain signature occurs, and based on the speed of this process, a conclusion is made about the state of the hard disk. Therefore, observance of certain precautionary rules is absolutely necessary: ​​before running the utility it is necessary to create backup copy   information and in the course of the audit act strictly according to the instructions of the developer of the corresponding software. To obtain more accurate results, it is better to close all active applications before scanning and to download possible background processes. In addition, it should be borne in mind that if you need to test the system HDD, you need to boot from the flash drive and run the scanning process from it or completely remove the hard drive and connect it to another computer from which to start testing the disk.

As an example, using HD Tune Pro, we will check the bad sectors of the HDD surface, which did not inspire confidence in the Crystal Disk Info utility. In this program, to start the scanning process, just select desired disk, activate the tab Error Scan   and click on the button Start. After that, the utility will start sequential scanning of the disk, reading the sector behind the sector and marking the sector disk with colored squares. The color of the squares, depending on the situation, can be green (normal sectors) or red (bad-blocks) or will have some intermediate between these colors. As can be seen from Fig. 10, in our case the full-fledged bad-blocks were not found by the utility, but nevertheless there is a solid number of sectors with some delay in reading (judging by their color). In addition to this, there is a small block of sectors in the middle of the disk, the color of which is close to red - the data of the sector has not yet been recognized as a utility by the utility, but they are already close to this and will go into the category of bad ones in the very near future.

Fig. 10. Surface scanning on bad sectors in HD Tune Pro

To test the media on bad sectors in the HDDScan program is more difficult, and even more dangerous, because in case of incorrectly selected mode the information on the disc will be irretrievably lost. First of all, to start the scan, create a new task by clicking on the button New Task   and selecting the command Suface Tests. Then you need to make sure that the mode is selected Read   - This mode is installed by default and when it is used, the hard disk surface is tested by reading (i.e., without deleting data). Then click on the button   Add Test   (Figure 11) and double-click on the created task RD-Read. Now in the opened window you can observe the process of scanning a disk on a graph (Graph) or on a map (Map) - Fig. 12. At the end of the process, we'll get about the same results as the ones demonstrated above by HD Tune Pro, but with a clearer interpretation: bad sectors   no (they are marked in blue), but there are three sectors with a response time of more than 500 ms (marked in red), which represent a real danger. As for the six orange sectors (response time from 150 to 500 ms), this can be considered normal, since such a response delay is often caused by temporary interference in the form of, for example, running background programs.

Fig. 11. Running a test drive in HDDScan

Fig. 12. Results of scanning a disk in Read mode using HDDScan

In addition, it should be noted that in the presence of a small number of bad blocks, you can try to improve the state of the hard disk by removing bad sectors by scanning the surface of the disk in the linear recording mode (Erase) using HDDScan. After such an operation, the disc can still be used for a while, but, of course, not as a system one. However, to hope for a miracle is not worth it, since HDD has already started to crumble, and there are no guarantees that in the near future the number of defects will not increase and the drive will not fail completely.

  Software for S.M.A.R.T.-monitoring and testing HDD

  HD Tune Pro 5.00 and HD Tune 2.55

Developer:EFD Software

Distribution size:HD Tune Pro - 1.5 MB; HD Tune - 628 Kbytes

Work under management:Windows XP / Server 2003 / Vista / 7

Method of distribution:   HD Tune Pro - shareware (15-day demo version); HD Tune - freeware (http://www.hdtune.com/download.html)

Price:HD Tune Pro - $ 34.95; HD Tune - free (only for non-commercial use)

HD Tune is a handy utility for diagnosing and testing HDD / SSD (see table), as well as memory cards, USB drives and a number of other storage devices. The program displays detailed information about the drive (firmware version, serial number, disk capacity, buffer size and data transfer mode) and allows you to set the device status using the S.M.A.R.T data. and temperature monitoring. In addition, it can be used to test the disk surface for errors and evaluate the performance of the device by running a series of tests (tests of sequential and random read / write speed, a file performance test, a cache test, and a number of Extra tests). Also, the utility can be used to configure AAM and secure removal   data. The program is presented in two editions: commercial HD Tune Pro and free lightweight HD Tune. In the edition of HD Tune, only detailed information about the disk and S.M.A.R.T. attribute table is available, as well as scanning the disk for errors and testing for the speed in the reading mode (Low level benchmark - read).

The Health tab is responsible for monitoring S.M.A.R.T.-attributes in the program. Data reading from the sensors is performed after a set period of time, the results are displayed in the table. For any attribute, you can view the history of its changes in numerical form and on a graph. Monitoring data is automatically recorded in the log, but no user notifications for critical changes of parameters are not provided.

As for scanning the disk surface for the presence of bad sectors, this operation is answered by the tab Error Scan. Scanning can be quick (Quick scan) and deep scan quick check   not the entire disk is checked, but only some part of it (the scanning zone is defined through the Start and End fields). Damaged sectors   They appear on the map of the disk as red blocks.

  HDDScan 3.3

Developer:Artem Rubtsov

Distribution size:3.64 MB

Work under management:Windows 2000 (SP4) / XP (SP2 / SP3) / Server 2003 / Vista / 7

Method of distribution:   freeware (http://hddscan.com/download/HDDScan-3.3.zip)

Price:is free

HDDScan is a utility for low-level diagnostics of hard disks, solid state drives   and Flash-drives with USB interface. The main purpose of this program is to test disks for bad blocks and bad sectors. Also, the utility can be used to view the contents of SMART, monitor the temperature and change some settings of the hard disk: AAM, power management (APM), forced start / stop of the drive spindle, etc. The program works without installation and can be started from portable media, such as a flash drive.

The S.M.A.R.T.-attribute mapping and temperature monitoring in HDDScan are performed on demand. Report S.M.A.R.T. contains information about the performance and "health" of the drive in the form of a standard table of attributes, the temperature of the drive is displayed in the system tray and in a special information window. Reports can be printed or saved in an MHT file. It is possible to conduct S.M.A.R.T.-tests.

The disk surface check is performed in one of four modes: Verify (linear verification mode), Read (linear reading), Erase (linear recording) and Butterfly Read (Butterfly reading mode). To test a disk for bad blocks, a test is usually used in the Read mode, which tests the surface without deleting the data (the drive status is derived based on the sector-by-sector read speed). When testing in the linear recording mode (Erase), information on the disc is overwritten, but this test can somewhat treat the disk, removing it from bad sectors. In either mode, you can test the entire disk completely or a specific fragment of it (the scanning zone is determined by specifying the start and end logical sectors - Start LBA and End LBA, respectively). The results of the testing are presented in the form of a report (Report tab) and are displayed on a graph and a map of the disk, indicating, among other things, the number of bad sectors and sectors, the response time of which took more than 500 ms during testing (marked in red ).

  Hard Drive Inspector 4.13

Developer:AltrixSoft

Distribution size:   2.64 MB

Work under management:   Windows 2000 / XP / 2003 Server / Vista / 7

Method of distribution:shareware (14-day demo version - http://www.altrixsoft.com/en/download/)

Price: Hard Drive Inspector Professional - 600 rub .; Hard Drive Inspector for Notebooks - 800 руб.

Hard Drive Inspector - a convenient solution for S.M.A.R.T.-monitoring of external and internal HDD. At the moment the market offers the program in two editions: the base Hard Drive Inspector Professional and the portable Hard Drive Inspector for Notebooks; The latter includes all the functionality of the Professional version, and at the same time takes into account the specificity of monitoring hard drives of laptops. Theoretically, there is still a version of SSD, but it is only distributed in OEM deliveries.

The program provides automatic verification of S.M.A.R.T.-attributes at specified time intervals and, at the end, issues its verdict regarding the state of the drive with the display of values ​​of certain conditional indicators: "reliability", "performance" and "no errors" along with the numerical value of temperature and temperature diagram. Technical data on the disk model, its capacity, general free space and the operating time in hours (days). In advanced mode, you can see information about the parameters of the disk (buffer size, name of the firmware, etc.) and the table of attributes S.M.A.R.T. There are various options for informing the user in case of critical changes on the disk. In addition, the utility can be used to reduce the noise level produced by hard disks, and reduce the power consumption of the HDD.

  HDDlife 4.0

Developer:   BinarySense, Ltd

Distribution size:8.4 MB

Work under management:Windows 2000 / XP / 2003 / Vista / 7/8

Method of distribution:shareware (15-day demo version - http://hddlife.ru/eng/downloads.html)

Price:   HDDLife - for free; HDDLife Pro - 300 rubles; HDDlife for Notebooks - 500 rubles.

HDDLife - a simple utility designed to monitor the status of hard drives and SSD (with version 4.0). The program is presented in three editions: free HDDLife and two commercial HDDLife Pro and HDDlife for Notebooks.

The utility monitors SMART attributes and temperature at specified intervals and, based on the results of the analysis, provides a compact report on the disk status with specification of the technical data on the disk model and its capacity, time worked, temperature, and also displays the conditional percentage of its health and productivity, which allows orient in the situation even for beginners. More experienced users can additionally see the table of S.M.A.R.T.-attributes. In case of problems with hard drive   the ability to configure notifications; You can configure the program so that the test results are not displayed when the disk is in a normal state. It is possible to control the noise level of the HDD and power consumption.

  CrystalDiskInfo 5.4.2

Developer:Hiyohiyo

Distribution size:1.79 MB

Work under management:Windows XP / 2003 / Vista / 2008/7/8/2012

Method of distribution:freeware (http://crystalmark.info/download/index-e.html)

Price:   is free

CrystalDiskInfo is a simple utility for S.M.A.R.T.-monitoring the status of hard drives (including many external HDDs) and SSDs. Despite the free of charge program has all the necessary functionality to organize the monitoring of the status of disks.

Disk monitoring is performed automatically after a specified number of minutes or on demand. At the end of the scan, the system tray displays the temperature of the monitored devices; detailed information about the HDD, indicating the values ​​of S.M.A.R.T.-parameters, temperature and program verdict about the status of the devices is available in the main window of the utility. There is a function for setting thresholds for some parameters and automatically notify the user if they exceed them. It is possible to control the noise level (AAM) and power (APM).

Unfortunately, a large part of modern HDDs work fine for a little more than a year, then various problems start that can eventually lead to data loss. Such a perspective can be avoided if you closely monitor the status of the hard drive, for example, using the utilities discussed in the article. However, to forget about the regular reservation of valuable data is also not worth it, since monitoring utilities, as a rule, successfully predict the failure of the drive due to the fault of "mechanics" (according to Seagate statistics, about 60% of HDDs fail due to mechanical components), but They are not able to predict the loss of the drive due to problems with the electronic components of the disk.

The hard drive of the computer every day works hard, processing huge amounts of data, constantly writing and erasing them. For several years of service, the condition of the drives may leave much to be desired: bad sectors, overheating, frequent mistakes. To protect your data from sudden problems, as well as to check the state of "health", there are a number of useful programs   to evaluate the performance of the HDD.

A small program to check the status of the hard drive. Despite the modest size, the functionality of this product is impressive. In addition to displaying temperature and health, you can get exhaustive information about your hard drive and all available functions of the device. In addition, you can configure various kinds of important alerts.

It is a pity that the Russian language HDD Health does not support, and on x64 systems, glitches in the interface are possible.

Victoria

A veteran in his field, an excellent program for diagnosing the drive. Unlike analogues, he can do a detailed check on reading, not missing a single sector. As a result of scanning, not only S.M.A.R.T. data, but also a graph of disk state by regions, as well as statistics on the speed of work of individual sectors. So this is the ideal program for checking the speed of the hard drive.

The long release date makes itself felt, frightening the unprepared user with sudden errors and an archaic interface.

HDDlife Pro

The most convenient program for checking HDD, with a hint of professionalism. Carries out both general analysis of drives, and monitoring during operation, reporting problems in a variety of ways.
  Most will appreciate the support of the Russian language and the visibility of the data display. This program will do everything quickly, qualitatively, and most importantly - independently.

HDDlife Pro is not happy with its availability - only 14 days are given for free use, and then you will have to pay for permanent monitoring.

It is not difficult to thoroughly check the hard drive. The developers have prepared for us a lot of tools that allow you to save your data in time and anticipate disruptions in the drive. And which of the programs did you prefer?