Hard Disk Cases
On the following pages, we try to illustrate some typical and special situations of hard disks and the technical background of the problems and symptoms. Where possible, recommendations are listed to help users to avoid these or similar disk problems and keep the hard disk drives as healthy as possible - to prevent data loss.
Note that most of the issues/symptoms can affect hard disks in general (from different manufacturers and model families). That's why the actual model ID is not listed on the following pages (except if a specific model / firmware is affected), to confirm that the situation is not limited only to that particular model.
Feel free to contact with questions and reports about your hard disk if you encounter same or similar issues. Also experiences about different, special situations, hard disk problems are always welcome, because if published, these may help other users to keep their data safe and prevent hard disk failures.
Bad sectors located on a specific area of the surface | |
Highly damaged hard disk surface area | |
Hard disk problems caused by high temperature (overheat) | |
Spin retries and spin up problems | |
Problems occurred between the communication of the disk and the host | |
There are weak sectors found on the hard disk surface | |
Hard disk total capacity can't be used, data loss may happen due to compatibility problem | |
Bad sectors may affect solid state disks (SSDs) too | |
Constant SSD health decrease related to normal usage (writes) which cause wearout | |
How to detect, verify a fake pendrive, fake memory card or hard disk drive |
New cases are constantly added so check back periodically to be informed about the descriptions of different hard disk problems and avoid them on your systems.