5 Signs When Your Hard Drive is Dying

In this digital world, use of computers comes down for manipulating the data. We all know that hard drive outlines the foundation of our computing. Generally, the hard drive is a place where we store all our data; photo albums, music, emails, work documents, and many more things.

However, many people realize that most electronic storage devices, including the hard drives, have a very limited lifetime when compared to the earliest ways of storing the information, like as papyrus, paper, stone. Though hard drive is one of the few mechanical devices that used in recent computing, and nowadays the average lifetime of the hard drive is around 5 to 10 years which usually depends on what kind of hard drive and manufacturer you have.

If you are not sure about how much time is left on your hard drive, then we suggest you read this article to know what signs may expose a forthcoming failure. Here we provide you five most common signs which indicate that your hard drive is going to die or a lifetime of your hard drive is over. They are as follows:

• Slowing down your computer, or Blue Screen of Death.
• Corrupted Data.
• Accumulation of Some Bad Sectors.
• M.A.R.T. Data.
• Strange Sounds.

1. Slowing Down Your Computer, or Blue Screen of Death

These signs are very unspecific and can be caused by multiple different things. Apart from what the issue behind these symptoms is, we recommend you to make a backup immediately. In case, after the fresh installation or in Windows Safe Mode, if these problems still exist then, it is sure that it is only due to bad hardware or probably due to a failing hard drive issue.

2. Corrupted Data

Whenever you find files that fail to open and are also corrupted even they saved without any errors or if any files suddenly disappear from your system, then it’s a topic of anxiety. This could be an issue of the multitude, and it is a sign for a gradual hard drive failure.

3. Accumulation of Some Bad Sectors

Generally, the Bad Sectors are those areas of the hard drive which do not maintain data integrity. While they are veiled by the operating system and hence hard to identify, especially when you currently used some large amounts of the disk, if you are truly run into bad sectors, then it is certainly a bad sign for your hard drive.

4. M.A.R.T. Data

S.M.A.R.T. refers to Self Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology data. These tools predict hard drive failure by reading the data which is recorded by the operating system.  For some strange reasons, many computers come with that feature disabled. To enable this feature, you need to find out how to get into your manufacturer’s BIOS or UEFI startup screen and also in the hard drive settings enable SMART monitoring.

5. Strange Sound

At times, when you are working on your computer, you hear some strange noise coming from your hard drive, but it may be too late — this repetitive sound is also known as the click of death which is usually caused by the head as it is trying to write data and recovers from errors.

Aida Martin is a creative person who has been writing blogs and articles about cybersecurity. She writes about the latest updates regarding mcafee.com/activate and how it can improve the work experience of users. Her articles have been published in many popular e-magazines, blogs, and websites.

Source:- Hard Drive