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Faulty HD

  • 13-02-2011 9:00pm
    #1
    Freddie59
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,679 ✭✭✭


    Bought a new Western Digital 2TB in PC World on Friday. Managed to back everything up to it. Immediately the backup finished, the drive crashed and is now showing as unformatted. (In disk management it's showing as healthy) and no amount of attempts to reformat it are successful. I've gone through everything I can on Google without success.

    I've used WD's own proprietary interrogation software and that tells me that sectors #256-512; 1024-2048 etc are faulty.

    My only concern in returning it is that the data contained within could be viewed by someone else with the correct software. It's mainly all our photos, music, and confidential documents.

    I'm thinking of just taking the hit. I would appreciate your opinions.

    Regards,

    Freddie.


Comments

  • #2
    James G
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 143 ✭✭James G


    If you do decide to return it, give DBAN a try.
    http://www.dban.org/


  • #3
    Freddie59
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,679 ✭✭✭Freddie59


    James G wrote: »
    If you do decide to return it, give DBAN a try.
    http://www.dban.org/

    Thanks for your help. DBAN can't get access to the drive either. I/O error.:mad:


  • #4
    IrishB.ie
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 383 ✭✭IrishB.ie


    The drive might have to be converted to GPT. If you are prepared to lose whats backed up on it, you could try this:
    Open Disk Management
    Delete any partitions or volumes on the drive
    Right-click the drive and click Convert to GPT Disk
    Then format it and test it.


  • #5
    ricman
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,559 ✭✭✭ricman


    You could try ultimate boot disk ,it has hd diagnostic tools,drive utilitys for seagate,western digital,fujitsu,maxtor,etc,or try booting from a livecd,eg linux mint.SEE http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/ ,if you have any important data it should always be backed on 2 separate hardrives.I HAVE DRIVES that work fine on pc1,2 but are completely invisible to pc 3,ie it could be a problem, with the os, drivers etc on your pc ,that stop it showing up properly.


  • #6
    bette
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 496 ✭✭bette


    If you used WD Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows you can write the zeros! That will wipe your disk for good.


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  • #7
    tman
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,339 ✭✭✭✭tman


    I'd definitely send it back to the manufacturer rather than PC World if I were in your shoes...
    WD not only have a fantastic RMA service, but I'd trust them to just check the drive at a low level rather than doing diagnostics in Windows and having a snoop around your files like PC world are known to do (then again, we have them to thank for locking up Gary Glitter!:p)...

    Perhaps try formatting it again as suggested above (full format to mark any bad sectors as unusable) and then overwrite it a few times if possible


  • #8
    crazyderk
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,058 ✭✭✭crazyderk


    I use to work in the section that does returns for pc world,
    They'll just ask you to pick up another from the shelf marks your as faulty and send it back to the returns section ultimately to go to WD for a refund, there's so many faulty hard drives/faulty laptops sent back that no-one will be looking at fixing your drive nor will they go about trying to access your data.

    I would be worried about if you go this drive back up and working that it could potentially fail again and all of your hard work would be wasted!


  • #9
    Freddie59
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,679 ✭✭✭Freddie59


    Thank you all for your kind help and comments.

    No matter what I do, no program (including WD's own zero-writer) can access the drive. Within disk management, it shows as healthy, but even if you right-click on it there, it will not allow you to delete the volume, or format the drive.

    Looks like it's just fried.

    Thanks again.

    Freddie.


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