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Hard Drive Diags

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by megtek Nov 8, 2002 last reply Dec 16, 2002

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Hey there..

I need a free (downloadable) hard drive diagnostic utility. I have hard drives that have been said to have bad sectors, but Scandisk is not picking them up. Need something better than scandisk. Preferably a utility that runs from afloppy in DOS mode.

Thanks.

14 replies

by maddiuex Nov 8, 2002

goto www.bootdisk.com and download the file for roubleshooter, It is awesome program for that.
If you cant find it, I can email it to you

Hope it helps

by megtek Dec 16, 2002

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by ann777 Nov 8, 2002

Scandisk will also run in DOS mode... or use chkdsk /f at the command prompt.

See if the below link helps:
http://www.frugalsworld.com/tweaking/scandisk.shtml

I've searched for downloadable alternatives to scandisk, but haven't been able tofind any.

You might try your drive manufacturer's sites for hdd utilities. Or your computer manufacturer sites if these drives are proprietary.

by megtek Nov 16, 2002

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by opatzg9 Nov 8, 2002

Go to your hard disk manufacturers web site for utilities. They will have them there.

by megtek Nov 16, 2002

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by derekhyps Nov 8, 2002

check to see if there are some command line switches for scandisk that will more thouroughly scan the drives. scandisk /?

by megtek Nov 16, 2002

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by agumnad Nov 12, 2002

If you've got partition magic from powerquest, it does a good job of mapping out bad sectors on your partitions, it runs from DOS and has a good graphical interface to help you get the job done.

Another way is that if you don't mind spending time and effort and having a disk with many partitions, Fdisk can also do the job. The way to do it is to create a partition (take note of your partition size) exit fdisk, reboot, format your new partition, take note of the % done when format starts to fall over. Multiply that % by you partition size, quit format, go back to fdisk and delete all partitions, create a new one using a smaller size than the one you calculated. If you can format this new partition without any trouble, create new partitions as needed and repeat the above procedure, new logical partition in extended partition shloud be made large enough to accomodate the identified bad sector so that it can be partitioned out.

It's a time consuming method but it works. I've triedit when hard disks cost both arms and a leg and have in the past created 10 partitions on a 1.8Gb disk with about 6 of them made usable.

Hope that helps