It happens to all of us: You turn on your system and see the stomach churning "disk not found" error.
It's really not surprising considering hard drives fail -- more often than you might think. You don't believe me, I know, so look at Study: Hard Drive Failure Rates Much Higher Than Makers Estimate.
Feeling SMART? Maybe Not
Some of you may use a program to monitor your drive's health as a way to help predict when your hard drive is about to hit the ubiquitous bit bucket. For instance, the $40 Hard Drive Inspector (15-day trial) does a terrific job providing the most intimate details about all the hard drives on your system. It also supports S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology) which tries to detect disk failure. Unfortunately, S.M.A.R.T. technology isn't always accurate. See It isn't smart to rely on SMART for the platter-shattering details.
Hard Drive Inspector tells you all about your drives.
Outsource Your Troubles
Tomorrow, I'll talk about some of the ways you can revive, resuscitate, and maybe even resurrect your ailing drive.
However, if your drive goes south before then, you can always take it to a chain's repair service. Then again, after watching this Computer Repair Undercover Investigation video, maybe not...
Hand over your money and get not-so-terrific advice.
Talkback
Tomorrow: More on hard drives. In the meantime, do you have something to say about hard drives -- or outsourced repairs? You can use Comments below or if you'd prefer, fire an e-mail right into my inbox.
Where is the old Bass and those great, always tactful yet always allowing us to read between the "fingers?" For years the Old Bass always told it like it is/was. I might snicker at his light touch on a serious matter. I tried to find another PC mag that would compliment PCW.But, I OD'ed in my search. In fact, one rag seemed so biased towards its advertisers I felt I had eaten spoiled shrimp scampi and had to be rushed to the ER to get my stomach pumped.Bits of shrimp, etc.;started flying as I lurched for an enemis pan. Oh ,Lord; someone else already used it ! You can only take so much of that kind of CONTENT PROVIDED without similar CONTENT PROVIDED yourself...all over; and, well, you get the idea. Except, I drenched my dear wife,who immediately reciprocated by taking a perfectly aimed head shot at me with the first thing she could grab. As I was getting stiched up I flipped the nasty pages of my wife's weapon (an ancient issue of PC World) an a guy named Bass.