How precise is S.M.A.R.T. technology?

Discussion in 'other software & services' started by TimaN, Nov 8, 2006.

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  1. Ice_Czar

    Ice_Czar Registered Member

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    there are two main things to keep in mind when employing SMART
    the first

    http://i18.tinypic.com/2dilue0.gif
    source PC Guide

    its useless for a great number of potential points of failure

    the second is that without enough data points it can generate misleading predictions.

    last time it checked it was 100 this time it checked its 50
    prognosis next time it checks following this average it will be dead
     
  2. MerleOne

    MerleOne Registered Member

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    Hi,

    Could you tell us what program do you use to display these parameters ? Thanks.

     
  3. Brian N

    Brian N Registered Member

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    Speedfan is quite good when you use the online analysis.
     
  4. Notok

    Notok Registered Member

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    I dunno about that. I just had a hard drive go south that is less than a year old. I got about 20 to 30 mins warning as I got to watch values go down very steadily and rapidly, but it was enough time to move my data off of it.
     
  5. Ice_Czar

    Ice_Czar Registered Member

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    your very lucky ;)

    SMART was never intended to be a realtime monitored system (it might trigger an email, you might get it tommorow)
    circuit boards and IC chips do degrade, but generally not to the point its very noticeable before total failure (discounting corruption) of course power events, impact ect arent predictible. There are alot of failure points where things go to hell in a handbasket in an awful damn hurry
     
  6. TimaN

    TimaN Registered Member

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    I use Hard Drive Inspector to monitor my HD.
     
  7. Mrkvonic

    Mrkvonic Linux Systems Expert

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    Hello,
    After running a couple of these progs for a few months, the predictions went from 2007 or so to 2020 or so. Crazy eh?
    Mrk
     
  8. jp10558

    jp10558 Registered Member

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    On this topic, I am very interested if anyone can tell me why these programs seem to be so confused on my PC (Also WD WDLG).

    I have a pretty unusual setup I guess so here goes.

    I have 1 IDE drive connected to the motherboard. I have 3 IDE drives connected to an Adaptec (previously a Highpoint, and this was the same) PCI expander(non-raid) card. I have 2 SATA II Drives connected to the motherboard.

    All these programs show a random assortment of my harddrives, but none of them show all the drives. For instance, HD Inspector showed drive C,D,K,L - Active SMART shows drives L,G,C,H,D - WD DLG shows Drive L twice, and drive C and D... Hell WD DLG shows Drive L twice, and one display Fails SMART and the other Passes SMART... The other testers noted PASS all the drives they see...

    So.. I don't really trust any of these programs as none of them even detect all my drives, forget about giving consistent data!

    I take it back, HDTune does see all the drives, this is a first - and in the free one!
     
  9. nadirah

    nadirah Registered Member

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    I don't usually check my values, but I remember that the last few times I checked it, all the values were in the green zone.
    Performance does decrease over time. Just think how much wear and tear a hard drive can suffer from in just one day. Defragmentation is critical as it may be the no.1 killer of hard drives.
    My old computer had a maxtor hard drive too, and it was not defragmented for 7-8 years! And it worked like a hero for those years until I erased all the data on it as I prepared for my new computer.
     
  10. TimaN

    TimaN Registered Member

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    My harddrive gets errors as shown on the screenshot. I have to run chkdsk utility to correct them. S.M.A.R.T. monitoring program records changes and brings up a warning screen that my harddrive's performance maybe impaired with decreased values of various SMART aspects. I never had a harddrive where I had to run check disk once a week. (I don't have to but I choose to eliminate problems). I run check disk from DOS command prompt and I run it several times and each time it finds different errors; only after 4 or 5 scans my drive is clean from errors. Is my harddrive going south?
     

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  11. MerleOne

    MerleOne Registered Member

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    It is not necessarily a hardware error. You should try :
    chkdsk <diskletter:> /F /X /R to be sure
    or use a freeware like HDTune, last version, to check the disk surface.

    Also, try to backup any important data on another physical HDD.
     
  12. AJohn

    AJohn Registered Member

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    As said above, SpinRite is the way to go.
     
  13. coolbluewater

    coolbluewater Registered Member

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    Did you delete an NTFS partition in those few months? :D
     
  14. Mrkvonic

    Mrkvonic Linux Systems Expert

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    Hello,
    Nope, I did not... Eventually the date went up to 2056.
    I have no idea why or how, but I'd like to see a hard disk that will last ~ 50 years.
    Mrk
     
  15. MICRO

    MICRO Registered Member

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    Mrk.,
    I only want the one that predicted 2020.
     
  16. TimaN

    TimaN Registered Member

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    When I do chkdisk runs, and after it finds and fixes errors my predictions increase.
     
  17. NGRhodes

    NGRhodes Registered Member

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    Please remember that spinrite does not actually fix physical errors, if a sector fails and spinrite fixes it by rewriting recovered information, then it can fail again.
    Use it only as a recovery tool - it cannot prevent errors from occuring again.
     
  18. 'G'

    'G' Registered Member

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    My recommendation is ActiveSMART.

    I have a 20% on my site if any one is interested.

    I beta test for all the developers on my site.

    www.software-discounts.com

    The new website will be live in 3 weeks time.

    G

    PS: To understand any program, you need to read the manual, if they have one.
     
  19. pandlouk

    pandlouk Registered Member

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    Do not relay to much in SMART technology. Most of the times when it warns you is already to late.

    If it ever happens (I know, it happened to me once) do not try to backup the entire disk. First get the most important things and then everything else; if the disk stay alive long enough.

    When I encountered this problem I managed to save only 3gb of data from a 40gb disk. After that it stopped spinning.:'(
     
  20. Brian N

    Brian N Registered Member

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    Endorsing yourself as a reseller is not allowed nor regarded as trustworthy on these forums.
    Keep in mind you are dealing with some of the most respected people in the security (and other areas) business, and endorsing yourself is a pretty bad start. Friendly advice that's all... If you wanna get mentioned you gotta make a great product that people will talk about. Spreading the word ..
     
  21. Climenole

    Climenole Look 'n' Stop Expert

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    Hi all :)

    About S.M.A.R.T.

    An article:

    What is S.M.A.R.T. and how can we use it to avoid data disaster?
    http://www.almico.com/sfarticle.php?id=2

    Read it carefully: to undestand the way to compute the values and the fact that iT,s dependant of manufacturer implementation... (so this is an other "standard" not-standard ...)

    About CHKDSK:

    the correct command is :

    Start | run | chkdsk X: /R
    where X: is the letter of the disk to be checked.

    The switch R include the switch F


    :)
     
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