[Gllug] Hadware Diagnostis disk

[general_email at technicalbloke.com]

On 23/02/11 15:52, Andrew Farnsworth wrote:
> When it comes to HDD, the best thing is to just replace it.  Costs are so
> low today that if there is any question at all about the health of a HDD it
> is better to pull that drive and replace it with a new one.  Either
> destroy/discard the questionable drive or move it to a non-critical use.
>
> Testing the MB etc, there are several bootable "live CD" images with many
> tools for testing all kinds of Hardware.  While this may not suit your needs
> (i.e. the computer in question is in a data center or something) you can
> certainly get a good idea of what tools are current by what is on the latest
> Live CDs for testing.
>
> Andy
>
> On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 10:41 AM, Dylan <dylan at dylan.me.uk> wrote:
>
>> Hi All,
>>
>> Any recomendations for a h/ware diagnostics boot disk? I'm looking for
>> tests
>> of HDD and as much of the motherboard as can be tested in software ...
>>
>> Any pointers gratefully received!
>>
>> Dx


Andrew, pls don't top post, and also there's no need to be so profligate
with somebody else's money! It's absolutely worth checking your disks
for errors otherwise you're replacing them on pure superstition alone!

I generally use seatools although it doesn't always run properly on all
hardware (based on crappy FreeDOS rather than linux sadly). All the
drive manufacturers have their own free (beer) testing tools and if you
want to send a drive back under warranty they will insist you use their
tool to verify it is bad before giving you an RMA.

Smartctl  (part of smartmontools), while not a boot disk, is available
on/via many boot disks and will give you a lot of info about your drive
and it's SMART data. Be careful though, I've just read (in the link to
stresslinux from John Hearn's post) that it can cause bad blocks on
Samsung F4 EcoGreen drives which might explain why the FreeNAS I built
last year has already chewed it's way through 3 of the damn things!!!

Roger

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