Software to test HDD [Archive]

View Full Version : Software to test HDD

Desmo

01-12-2008, 11:24

My mates comp has gone tits up. Not booting Windows, even in safe mode. I think the HDD has some corrupt sectors or something. I've managed to copy all of his data across to a backup drive using Ubuntu live CD but a few file wouldn't copy due to corruption.

Is there something that I can run on a bootable CD so I can test the HDD? If it comes out OK then I'll just do a fresh XP install. If not I'll replace the drive.

loki

01-12-2008, 11:29

Davey_Pitch

01-12-2008, 11:33

Try The Ultimate Boot CD (http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/) :)

Daz

01-12-2008, 11:34

From your Live CD:

http://www.ubuntu-unleashed.com/2008/10/gsmartcontrol-hard-disk-drive-health.html

Nice tool that :) If there's data corruption tbh I'd just be binning the HDD, even if SMART says it's ok I wouldn't trust it, especially with drives so cheap.

Desmo

01-12-2008, 11:37

Don't remember seeing that on the Live CD. Was using 8.04.

I think I might just order up the new drive and play it safe. He was happy enough to do that and it might just be the simplest route. He only wants a small'ish drive too so cost is low.

Daz

01-12-2008, 11:39

Don't remember seeing that on the Live CD. Was using 8.04.
It isn't, but the .deb's are linked to from that post and you can install it in the live environment :)

Desmo

01-12-2008, 11:56

Ah right. Problem is he has a crappy USB ADSL modem and I couldn't be arsed trying to get the net working ;D

Daz

01-12-2008, 11:59

Fair do's :D

Get him to bin that modem though, a Windows machine has no place wholly exposed to the intarweb!

Desmo

01-12-2008, 12:07

Will the repair utility work in XP if you boot direct from XP Install disk ??
Not tried it yet. It's the typical case of bought machine 3 years ago, know nothing about computers, doesn't keep CD's safe, no backup of family photos.
I need to grab hold of an XP OEM CD now.

I've still got to try and sort out the photos yet. They use Kodak Easyshare software :(
I can find some of the original jpg's but they say there should be more. They're either hidden away or stored in some kodak data file somewhere. Now I've got the machine at mine I can have a proper dig around. Last nights job was to just make sure I could get hold of all their stuff on a backup.

Daz

01-12-2008, 12:40

If it comes to it, you could let scalpel (http://www.digitalforensicssolutions.com/Scalpel/) loose on the block device. It will get you a *lot* of files though, so I wouldn't recommend it as a first stop.

Or photorec (http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec) is also pretty good, not sure if that's in the repo's though.

Desmo

01-12-2008, 12:50

I'll take a look at those if I have to :)

What I'm hoping to do is just install Kodak Easyshare again and then drop the old folders/files in to the new install and see if it picks everything up again. It should do I would have though.

Mark

01-12-2008, 13:26

AFAIK Kodak Easyshare doesn't do anything funky with the JPEGs. I think my parents use it (but they do back up).

Desmo

01-12-2008, 21:27

After finally sorting out all the dependencies I managed to get Gsmart running ;D

It's found a few errors so I think it's worth ordering up a new drive, if only to save future headaches...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v112/piggymon/Odds%20and%20Ends/1.jpg

Daz

01-12-2008, 21:33

Any SMART errors and it's definitely bin time. Sometimes drives can be dead/dying and SMART reports ok, so if you're getting errors then it's definitely not somewhere you want to be putting your data ;D

Might be worth taking an image of it while it's still relatively readable.

Desmo

01-12-2008, 22:11

I've already backed up their files when I went over last night. Thought that whilst I had it showing in Ubuntu I'd copy it all over to my external drive just in case it died at any time.

Will order up a new drive tomorrow. Got an XP OEM disc so should be pretty straight forward from now on in :)