Hard Drive Problem

dannyk13 | 08:30 Wed 24th Oct 2018 | Technology

28 Answers

AVAST ran a diagnostic check on my laptop which showed my hard drive's health at 50%.
1. What does this mean?
2.Can anything be done to improve it?
Plain English please, I am a technophobe.

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Old_Geezer

It means it's coping with the bits of the drive not presently working by using the bits that still are. It means you should perform a new back-up and go look for new drive prices.

dannyk13

Question Author

If I get a technician to fit a new hard drive will he be able to transfer everything from the old drive to the new?

Old_Geezer

You could buy and run spinrite on it, but even it can't fix magnetic parts of your disk that is failing to hold data.

Once backed up you could always try a reformat and further disk check. But you probably need to go buy a drive anyway before it fails completely.

Old_Geezer

Probably but best to have that full disk back-up / copy just in case.

dannyk13

Question Author

Thanks OG, but will the technician be able to transfer everything from the old drive to the new?

Old_Geezer

All this said, I've no experience of the accuracy of an Avast check.

dannyk13

Question Author

AS I said I am utterly useless at the technical stuff.

Old_Geezer

What does the Windows' disk test say about your drive ?
Not at my PC at present but if you right click the drive in the file browser it should give various options such as disk check IIRC

dannyk13

Question Author

File browser?

bhg481

If you're talking about a laptop with only one physical hard drive, maybe divided into partitions, then you need to get the drive cloned, not just copied, or you will lose your operating system. Any competent computer shop will do this for you (a DIY job for anyone familiar with computers) and you could take the opportunity to replace the drive with a larger one or an SSD.
The first thin to try is a repair on the disc. Using Explorer to show all the discs on your laptop, right-click on one of them and select "properties" > "tools" > "error checking" - "check now" and tick both boxes. Some discs it can do on a live system, others (like the system disc) need to be done before the next start-up. This is a completely harmless procedure - no data will be lost but anything written on a dicky part of the disc will be moved to a good section. Do that for all the discs on your system - if your problem persists it's time for a replacement whilst the data is still able to be read.

ToraToraTora

As above your drive uis on the way out, 50% of it is marked as unusable.
you can do this yourself quite easily but a technician would
1. Take your drive out of the machine
2. Clone the contents onto a new drive exactly the same as the bad one.
3. install the new drive back into the machine
4. Defrag the new drive.
voila!

ichkeria

“50% healthy” doesn’t sound like a very informative or helpful message to me.
I’d study the details before doing anything drastic

ToraToraTora

it is very informative and helpful ich, what part of "50% healthy" is troubling you?

dannyk13

Question Author

TTT //you can do this yourself quite easily//
No I couldn't,as I said I am useless at anything technical to do with my laptop.

ToraToraTora

Ok fair enough, I have one of these:https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/All-In-1-2-5-3-5-IDE-SATA-HDD-Hard-Drive-Disk-Clone-Holder-Dock-Station-USB-TR/132713844398?epid=1360437308&hash=item1ee65c8eae:g:tGYAAOSwJQdXCGkZ:rk:7:pf:0
unscrew the back of the lap top get the drive out, most have a flap with the drive directly under it, buy one the same and clone it and put it back in, sorted! Note it needs Cloning, NOT copying. Anyway danny the shop will do the above for a fee.

ToraToraTora