Bad sectors are found on almost all HDDs. Especially on those that are actively used for a long time. Sometimes a problem gets out of control and turns into a real disaster, destroying all the data on the HDD in any partitions. To prevent this from happening, learn how to restore bad sectors of your hard drive at home.
What are bad sectors and why do they appear?
You can imagine a bad block in the form of a book with the last chapter torn out. You can read it up to a point. But as soon as there is a space in the pages, you cannot finish reading. HDD also works. The magnetic head reads information within the track, but at some point it encounters a damaged surface or an empty bit of information, which leads to the inability to extract the information to the end.
Almost all hard drives have bad partitions. It can be one or several, and in most cases it is not scary. But over time, they become more and more and more and more difficult to operate with information on the HDD. Such areas can be detected by scanning the hard disk for bad sectors with special utilities.
There can be many reasons for the appearance of bad sectors:
- hit the disc or use in the wrong conditions;
- interruption of recording by turning off the power;
- overheating and temperature jumps;
- natural wear on the heads and burner;
- low-quality products.
You can immediately divide the broken sectors into non-recoverable and recoverable. The first include those caused by shock or overheating. They are destroyed once and cannot be restored, and information, as a rule, disappears irrevocably. The second type of bad sectors appears as a result of a break in the recording process. They can be revived by simply rewriting the disc.
Over time, write and read speeds may decrease. And after a small drop in your laptop, the drive may even refuse to work. Everything would be really bad if there was no way to regenerate bad blocks in some way. The fact is that hard disks have a certain reserve area, which means that a potentially larger volume than stated in the check. You can use the extra space to transfer contents to it from damaged areas. How to restore bad sectors of the hard drive in this way is described below.
Danger is near
You can notice the problem not only after a hard drive failure, but also in the initial stages. You should be wary after the following symptoms:
- write / read speed of the disc has dropped;
- unusual noise is heard when accessing the HDD;
- began to overheat;
- the hard drive has been subjected to mechanical stress;
- the system often falls off, and when it starts, chkdsk starts automatically.
Typically, these reasons indicate the beginning of the end of your HDD. In order not to lose data, the first good solution would be a backup. Transfer all the necessary files to another computer, flash drive, disk, and, if possible, even set up synchronization with the cloud.
Most modern hard drives are checked for bad sectors themselves, without user intervention. This is both good and bad, because you cannot influence the elimination of bad blocks and learn about their appearance on system partitions.
When to scan?
You can scan the hard drive for errors with a certain frequency, which depends on the frequency of use of the computer and is calculated individually. Someone conducts scheduled computer maintenance once a month, someone - once every six months.
To do this, you can use system utilities or programs to recover bad sectors of the hard drive. A scan should be performed immediately after detecting the problems listed above.
Scanning with regular tools
Starting with Windows 8, the system itself is able to scan disks on a schedule and thereby extend the operation of the HDD. You can configure the scan schedule at the address: “My Computer” / “Management” (a tab will appear in the main menu when the section is active). In Windows, checking a hard disk for bad sectors can be done with the regular chkdsk program. The utility can be launched in several ways:
- Through the command line with administrator rights, when the system is loaded and functioning.
- Through a boot disk / flash drive without logging in. Useful when the OS is unable to boot.
The work is not fundamentally different, so consider the first option:
- Open a command prompt as administrator. Right-click on the Start menu icon or just in the lower left corner on Windows 8 and select "Command Prompt (Administrator)" from the list.
- If you want to scan a non-system disk, enter the command with the chkdsk / f / r keys to scan and immediately fix the entire disk, and chkdsk D: / f / r to fix only the D partition or any other one. In addition, you can enter the / x switch to disable the volume being checked during the scan. In case of diagnostics of a working disk, the program will offer to reboot in order to perform work without logging in.
- If chkdsk finds errors in the partitions used, it will offer to reboot and fix sectors before the system starts.
To display all options, type help chkdsk. A list appears in which all available keys with explanations are visible. You can use any combination of your choice if you understand the essence of what is happening and the possible consequences. At the end of the scan, all data about the operation will be displayed in the log.
Third party programs
In addition to the built-in chkdsk, third-party programs can be used to fix bad sectors on the hard drive. There are many software that can repair damaged partitions.
Among the popular free software I would like to highlight Victoria. This program to restore bad sectors of the hard drive is well known and at one time was very popular with masters. The Victoria program is able to work both in window and in DOS mode, which allows you to use it even on dead systems to recover information.
Interface Victoria
The program is perfect for recovering bad sectors of the hard drive. Victoria is intended more for experienced users, since it practically does not contain an interface and does not even have a crack in the kit. But this does not prevent her from working correctly with hardware and file systems.
There are a lot of settings, switches and different numbers, and when you open the program for the first time, it can be difficult to navigate. But, following the instructions below, let's find out how to recover bad sectors on the hard drive.
Testing and analysis
In the Smart tab of this program, you can quickly assess the overall status of the disk. The score is set based on the analysis of the various values ​​shown in the table. There you can view the status of each parameter individually.
For simple testing, go to the Tests tab. There are quite a lot of settings in each section, therefore, for the initial analysis, you can leave everything by default. Click on the Start button and wait for the test to complete. A full check of a hard disk for bad sectors takes a long time. Therefore, you can safely leave the test for the night and go to sleep.
Additionally, the window contains a graph of speed or color indication of sectors. You can switch the view by the Grid flag near the timer.
Sector Correction
If you wait for a few checks, there is no time, then after assessing the condition, you can immediately proceed to the treatment of bad sectors of the hard drive. Victoria uses the Remap method to rewrite blocks. It reassigns the bad blocks to normal, from the backup disk space. To repair bad sectors, do the following:
- select Remap instead of Ignore in the test menu directly above the timer;
- run a scan;
- wait for the check to complete.
During the check, all errors found and a report on the measures taken will be displayed in the log. It also indicates on which part of the disk problems were detected.
How to crop?
Often, bad partitions prevail at the beginning or end of a disk. The thought immediately visits: “And if you do not use space with bad sectors?” Yes, it can be cut off and no longer used. You can find out which section of disk space is best cut off by:
- Run a scan in Remap mode.
- Watch the log. The first error reports will indicate in which area of ​​the HDD the bad blocks are located.
- If they could not be repaired, just throw them out of the workspace.
- Enter the approximate number from the log in the Start LBA field and run the test again.
- In the section below, near the progress bar, you can see in which section of memory the broken sections appeared. You can track a sector by LBA blocks, and by value in MB. For example, there is a broken area of ​​16,000 MB.
- Through any disk partitioner, say, Acronis or the standard Windows tool, we crop the area from the beginning to 20 GB and leave it unused. Broken blocks of this section are no longer active, which means they will not be disturbed for some time.
It is worth working with the system drive only in DOS mode until the OS is loaded. While backup or restore can be marked up directly from under Windows. This method is good for a large HDD. But it doesn’t help to restore the damaged partitions on the hard drive, as it happens during the remap process.
Prevention
So that the hard drive does not "die" in your arms, it is advisable to carry out some preventive measures. Depending on the type of equipment.
If you have a laptop:
- try not to hit him;
- do not shake much, especially during working hours;
- Do not subject to vibration or temperature changes.
If you have a desktop computer:
- Do not place the system unit in a damp place;
- do not overheat components;
- even though the HDD itself is tight, the board may be damaged by a layer of dust, so get rid of it;
- install additional cooling on the hard drive if the computer is actively used or the hard drive is unable to cool on its own.
A useful preventative measure for all hard drives is defragmentation. For its implementation, there are many programs, both full-time and third-party.
Now you know how to restore bad sectors on the hard drive and, perhaps, you can even save valuable information on it in case of problems.