Hard Disk Drive Failure Prediction - S.M.A.R.T.


Way back on January 26, 2006, I wrote that it is not a question of IF your HDD (Hard Disk Drive) will fail, but rather WHEN it will fail.  If you think about the fact that all your music, your pictures, your home movies, just about everything that makes up our modern life is on your HDD, you can begin to understand the panic that can set in when a hard drive really and truly fails.
Hopefully, this has never happened yet to you, but the longer you use a computer, the more likely that it will.  Of course, the best thing to do is make sure all of your irreplaceable data is backed up regularly!  I plan to discuss this further in upcoming articles.
Right now, I want to talk about the technology that exists on each and every HDD.  Just like your car has a computer control system that most of us never interact with, your HDD has a system in place to control and analyze itself, yet we never deal with it. This system is called S.M.A.R.T. (Self Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology)  As you start to read and dig into the data available, you will come to see that it is very possible for you to know about an impending HDD failure!  Now, does that mean that if you use a S.M.A.R.T. monitoring tool that you no longer need to back up your files?  Of course not!  However, knowing the health of your HDD will give you the opportunity to know whether or not you can trust the security of your files, or how soon you need to budget for a replacement drive. 
There are many different tools for monitoring your drive's S.M.A.R.T. status, but after years of trying different ones, I settled on Hard Disk Sentinel.  I have been using this tool as shareware for a very long time, and it has helped me several times by letting me know that a drive I was counting on, was not to be counted on.  It has also helped me to determine the reason for system instability in certain builds.  For these, and many other reasons, I am happy to report I have become a paying supporter of this product. 
Give it a try, or search through the list of other S.M.A.R.T. tools to find one that may better suit your needs.  Any way you go about it, having more information concerning the health of your system, and your HDD in particular, the better.
Location: Windsor, ON, Canada

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