Bad Clusters on HARD DRIVE....

[DeA7hWiSh]

I dont kno what it is... but when there are Bad clusters or sectors whichever one it is... can they be repaired or is the hard drive screwed for life? I have tried Deleting the partion and formatin and the bad clusters are still there is there another way of gettin rid of them or are they there for life? THANK YOU...

[krazie662]

WHat brand HD is it? Try using the diagnostics that your brand HD provides, and you can probalby find it on their website. SOmetimes their program fixes them, sometimes not- but atleast u can get a RMA

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[reefcity]

i think norton ultilites 2002 can fix bad sectors

[Spineshank]

Some programs will fix them.

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[Isezumi]

I have three words for you, that scare the hell out of every competent computer users in the world. LOW LEVEL FORMAT. If its a superficial bad cluster/sector it will bother you no more, if its physical damage to the disc then youll know. *Warning: I and am sure every other member of this forum agrees that unless you have lotsa free time on your hand, that a low level format is the absolute last thing that you want to do, this will effectively Nuke your HDD, erasing and recreating all sectors and clusters on the physical disk. Very cruel, very effective.

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[Isezumi]

Also programs like Norton and what not, do not always necessarily fix your BAD sectors/Clusters as they Identify and catalog them so that, they are completely ignored by the system (the system never attempts to read from or write to those areas). The one thing that sucks about this is, that if I sector/Cluster is tagged as BAD that doesnt mean that it is all bad, just that a part of parcel of it is bad, and since there is no half a sector/cluster, if one bit is bad, you lose the whole thing, losing all the other good space that is left (and in high volume drives, that is alot of space)
CMA: this is how I know it to work, I do not know if advancements in technology have allowed programs to mess around the physical format of drive, to isolate only the specific portions that are bad and Manipulate the rest of the Sector/Cluster and rebuild it to working condition.

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"The wise man is slow to speak but quick to act."
-Confucius

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[johnny43]

Check to see if the HD is still under Warnt. Most Major Mans have a three to five years replacement Warnt. Just go the website and they have a check on most websites

[boob]

So how exactly is a LOW LEVEL FORMAT done in comparison to the typical format that I do in DOS (or the windows boot disk) when re-installing the OS?

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[reefcity]

lowe level formating is done by the manufactured at their plant. You should never low level format .

[jstnomega]

this really works http://grc.com/spinrite.htm imo, best $ I ever spent on SW, inc OS

[DeA7hWiSh]

sounds like your the owner of that software trying to sell it... im cheap does anyone know any other program? lol... =) i really need it... well I really dont think anything can fix the hard drive that I have with bad clusters its like all over the hard drive... lol... its like a nuclear bomb virus hit it lol...

[OS-Wiz]

Originally posted by DeA7hWiSh:
sounds like your the owner of that software trying to sell it... im cheap does anyone know any other program? lol... =) i really need it... well I really dont think anything can fix the hard drive that I have with bad clusters its like all over the hard drive... lol... its like a nuclear bomb virus hit it lol...

Some friendly advice -- BACK UP YOUR DRIVE NOW!!!!!!!!!!! This usually signals a crash is coming . . .



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HTH, Rick