SMART Harddrive Failure Imminent

[Crucio]

Ok, so i goto boot up my computer (which was built January 2003) and i get the message "SMART harddrive failure imminent, backup files and replace harddrive immediately... Press F1 to continue"

...

wtf!

Why would this happen? I know i had some trojan viruses, i was in the process of removing them. Could they cause HD failure? Or what could it be? Not overheating, ive got a lian-li full case with a lot of fans. and its only a year and some months old.

Is there anyway to save the data? Its obviously starting atleast, so that means the harddrive is still recognized right? What would be the best way to save the data? System works startup disk?

Thankyou everyone.

[communist]

Well SMART is telling you that your HDD is in bad condition and that a drive failure is imminent. If you can still access the drive then just back up to another drive or CD/DVD.
I once had a problem with my hdd - windows didn recognize it properly (telling me the file system was borked :| ).
I loaded up Knoppix from CD and could access my drive - though very slow. I still managed to back up about 99% of my data using the integrated K3B burning application.

Some mp3s had a lot of glitches and became useless but still better than what any free windows tool was able to do :)

[Crucio]

man, this is stupid


but thanx.

i cant believe it failed

i need to buy a whole new drive now?

[Sirber]

Yep :(

[dani82]

once a warning is recieve, does that mean i have a couple hours/days before it starts going bad; or is it, right here, right now, save what you can, cause this is it

[TotalChaos]

A SMART error is simply the drive's "health" moniter telling the computer that somthing critical has gone wrong. There realy isn't any time frame, but when you recieve a SMART error your best bet is an immediate BACKUP. I've had a drive in a RAID 0 send SMART errors for about 3 weeks untill it finaly corrupted a critical windows file and didn't reboot. I was able to install another windows copy on another HDD and then retreive about 99% of all files intact from the array though.

[Sirber]

Originally posted by dani82
once a warning is recieve, does that mean i have a couple hours/days before it starts going bad; or is it, right here, right now, save what you can, cause this is it I had one hard disk at work that got that error some months ago. I think it's still working :D

[smiller667]

If you are interested in what went wrong, get a hdd analysis from the manufacturer of your drive - it will often be able to give you some more information.

Of course you can trust your luck and choose to ignore the message - a friend of mind did because "it still booted" ... until the hdd was completely dead and inaccessible :D.

[Sirber]

Sometimes, lazyness comes first :D

[Crucio]

im gonna leave it off for about a week or so, then i figure ill buy a new drive, install windows, and then copy my stuff off. im just usin a diff comp till then

btw, naruto is awesome

[Sirber]

Woot Woot for Naruto :D :D :D

Don't forget to backup your HDD while you can :)

[Crucio]

hey, how do i make the hd letter different. I want the new hd to be c. but windows makes it j when i reinstall it.

thanx

[Sirber]

You have to go in system management, then drive manager. There you can change your drive letter.

If you format, drive C will be the first partition of the first disk. Swap your IDE cables :)

[Crucio]

the cables are exactly the same as they were, thats strange. Maybe ill just unplug the other drive


thanx