HDD General Problem for General Hardware Gurus

I'm pretty sure this is the case: I have a small scratch on on my HDD and it is causing a minor defect that will probably spread over time until my drive completely suxors.

The symptoms: I did a right-click, properties task a month or so ago to see how large a folder was and received a grinding noise from my HDD :( Now, I formatted the drive and it won't load windows b/c setup detects a fault (so I partitioned 10GB just to get back up and running). The NTFS format went through after I put windows on the 10GB, though?!

The precautions: I already have all of my data on a second hard drive.

What I want to know is, is there any software out there that would give me a better idea of where and how bad this problem is? Perhaps I could partition around it? I just want a drive to install and run my os(s) and software on. I'd hate to spend more than $30 on a drive less than 50GB :p Any helpful hints would be great :D

Each hard drive manufacturer has a utility to test their hard drives. Just go to the manufacturers website and download a diagnostic utility. It should provide you with instructions on what to do. It sounds like your hard drive may die soon if it was making a grinding noise. :(

Yep, I'm afraid your drive is a "screwed pooch". All the software can do is tell ya how bad it is.
The good news is you have your data backed up!

I wouldn't invest 5 more minutes of time tinkering with a drive that is mechanically bad...but that's just me. ;)