Replace this hard drive?

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Haole Boy

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Need some assistance from the hard drive gurus. Have a very strange hard drive issue...

Working on a customer's machine (Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit) and ran gSmartCtl to see what's going on with the hard drive. There are two SMART attributes flagged for attention: (full output from gSmartCtl is attached to this post)

191 G-Sense_Error_Rate 0x0032 004 004 050 Old_age Always FAILING_NOW 96

193 Load_Cycle_Count 0x0032 001 001 050 Old_age Always FAILING_NOW 1185350

So, I tried running the short test. It finished in a few seconds (estimated time was 2 minutes) and I see the folllowing in the log (sorry the formatting is not good.

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
Num Test_Description Status Remaining LifeTime(hours) LBA_of_first_error
# 1 Short offline Interrupted (host reset) 90% 29276 -
# 2 Short offline Aborted by host 10% 29276 -

This drive had some other strange issues (could not be seen by windows when hooked up via docking station).

So.. should I recommend that the customer replace this drive? It does seem to actually work, but the system seems a little slow.

Mahalo for your assitance!

Harry Z.
 

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Any time you find yourself wondering "should I replace this drive?" the only safe answer is yes.

labtech said:
For consistency purpose, I would test the SMART values with several tools. Also, I would run a surface scan. Like MHDD for example.
Click to expand...

Is there any possible result from these tests that would make you want to keep the drive?

It's not the odds. It's the stakes.
 
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Be glad at least your are actually confronted with obvious Gsmart failures you can point to as easy justification for drive replacement, at least eliminating doubts or potential guilt as to suggesting the obvious course of action. (change it, SSD!)
 
If I ever doubt that the hard drive could be malfunctioning I always replace it, and in fact I will ONLY replace it with an SSD. It's just not worth digging through the drive running clean up after clean up and tweak after tweak just to MAYBE get another 10% of performance out of it.

The problem with doing clean-ups on 7200rpm drives is even if you squeeze another 10% out of it the end user will get used to the speed in a week and the 10% won't feel like anything. Even bumping up the RAM is barely worth it nowadays unless the system is CLEARLY lacking RAM.

Now if you can guarantee a 50%-80% increase in performance by dropping in an SSD then they will be happy for months or even years.

The way I look at it is I can spend hours for 10% for what $100? Or I can drop an SSD for 70% more juice, make more money for less hassle (and it's usually auto-pilot, at least with Samsung Data Migration). If they don't want to pay for an SSD upgrade (Like they need a 500GB Samsung 850 - $160 which I will sell for $220 + $100 for mirroring), then I just tell them to buy a new computer, preferably with an SSD.

I just don't have the time or desire to bust my ass for such modest gains in performance, while fighting a slow dying system and cheap customer the whole way through.
 
brandonkick said:
If I have any reason to suspect the drive, it gets replaced.

Drives are too cheap, and I don't want to risk data loss or a
****** off customer.
Click to expand...

We look at it a bit different around here.
The price of a new drive and my time to install OS and customer data is not "too cheap" for many of my customers. Most just want the drive running again so they can get their stuff off of it or use it for browsing. So many drives have had an "episode" (lid slammed, set down hard on a table, etc.) and when scanning you can see usually the damage is in one spot (a few sectors) on the drive instead of a huge block or peppered throughout the drive. Recover the data, mark as bad and move on. I discuss the "care and handling" with the client and give no warranty on the repaired drive (unless they want a new drive). I've had no issues doing it this way for years and I can't even remember one customer coming back later for replacement. My time is a few minutes to pull the drive and run it on the bunch overnight. This works well in my area. Your mileage may vary.

BTW - I'm seeing a large increase in "damaged" drives since Win10 came out. Win10 is the culprit for this lid slam failure. The screen goes black on Win10 quickly but the HDD continues frantically in the background for another 10-15 seconds (while the user slams the lid and throws it in their backpack).

Oh! I should add that the above is from a residential/home user viewpoint (which is the market I support). I always recommend a replacement drive for a business.
 
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Diggs said:
Win10 is the culprit for this lid slam failure. The screen goes black on Win10 quickly but the HDD continues frantically in the background for another 10-15 seconds (while the user slams the lid and throws it in their backpack).
Click to expand...
Turn off fast startup in power settings.
 
Diggs said:
The price of a new drive and my time to install OS and customer data is not "too cheap" for many of my customers.
Click to expand...

I don't think he was talking about a "replace and reinstall" so much as a "If the drive is sending iffy signals, clone onto a new drive immediately." No installation or much of anything else there.
 
Yeah, that's what I was getting at.

Usually I'll make a clone, and deploy that clone to a new drive.

Unless it's mission critical data, or the customer expresses some concern
about the nature of the data on the disk. I recommend professional data
recovery at that point, without bothering to try to clone.

If it's stuff they can stand to lose, even if they wouldn't "like" to lose it.... I'll
try to clone to a new disk using clonezilla.
 
Diggs said:
The price of a new drive and my time to install OS and customer data is not "too cheap" for many of my customers.
Click to expand...
And how much is it for that labor? Then how much is it for the future n&p, reinstall and data recovery from your competitor just a little bit down the road?

I discuss the "care and handling" with the client and give no warranty on the repaired drive (unless they want a new drive). I've had no issues doing it this way for years and I can't even remember one customer coming back later for replacement.
Click to expand...

Perhaps that is not because it works great, but because you more or less told them "no warranty, because this is a **** repair and I know it" so they don't come back to you because you sold them a **** repair that didn't last. Remember, in the customers eyes they've done nothing wrong, you just scammed them out of their money. It doesn't matter how many times you tell them "via is a **** repair, don't do it" all they will remember is "I paid this dude x dollars and it didn't even last x amount of time. Be knew it'd wouldn't work that's why he won't warranty it. Im sure as hell not going back there."

If you're just letting the "repair" run overnight anyways I doubt it's going to kill the customer to spend another $30 or $40 for a new drive and for you to do the exact same amount of work by letting it clone overnight with ddrescue. If you can't sell a $40 hdd to someone who owns a computer that has a bad one then you really ought to take a salesmanship class.

Sorry if I sound a bit blunt, but your customers are likely spending more money, possibly significantly more in the long run, and running the risk of losing important or sentimental data because you're assuming they can't afford the $40 right now.

You may be assuming that because they're telling you that. But almost always they're saying that not because they truly can't afford it, but because they think it's not important and a pointless expense. And they probably think that because you offer them a cheaper alternative.

Many people are idiots when it comes to their money and if they can save 40 bucks by shooting themselves in the foot, they'll do it even if they have an extra grand in their wallet with nothing to spend it on. That is why people buy $250 Wal-Mart specials computers even though 99% of people looking to buy a laptop can indeed afford a good one. They just don't have anyone to prove to them that a Wal-Mart laptop is a piece of ****.

"Fixing" hard drives is the Wal-Mart special of the repair industry. Don't be the Wal-Mart special. The world will thank you.
 
@Krynn72 - Don't be so clueless. I live in a small community. I see these people all the time and they see me at stores, schools, events, etc. They all know where I live (for 32 years) and know I welcome questions or problems and how to get a hold of me. Get your head out of your a** and try not to be so narrow minded.

(Maybe I should add I've been tweaking, jerking, watching and slapping drives around for 35 years and I may have a bit more experience than "Walmart".)

I don't push my business model on others or tell them how to run their shop, why are you?
 
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Computer Bloke said:
It's astonishing how well an SSD fixes this problem.

That one too.
Click to expand...

Agreed and agreed. Unfortunately, in my market I quote $100 for a standard HDD and lose about 30% of the business right there. People just pay the diagnostic fee and move on. SSDs haven't been popular at all here because of price and very few are interested in the speed. Especially where DSL is lucky to hit 1 Mbps. They don't feel the need for speed........
 
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