File errors on portable hard drive

[Guest ruiagnelo]

I have had this WD 500 gb portable hd for quite a long time and in the last months i noticed it sometimes unplugged with no reason at all, which i later came to associate with the use of a very small usb cable (about 25 centimeter long) that would cause this with sudden movements of the computer. only about two weeks ago, after i plug it, a message appeared mentioning errors on some files, and that same message shows now everytime i plug it.

it tells me to either check for errors, which i haven't done yet, because i know it will delete damaged files and i won't take the risk or either proceed with no checking, after which it runs normally.

 

i have more than a half of the full capacity with documents and of course music, that i really don't want to lose, so i am trying to solve this the right way. i know of people who plug their hds and get "need to format" messages, so i guess mine is not that bad.

 

i thought about doing a backup to other disk, then format mine and move the files again, but if the error is in the files, maybe that won't solve it. or maybe i should just do the checking, but i don't know exactly whay is damaged, so i am afraid of doing it.

 

suggestions?

[Bob Dylan]

...and let me guess, you didn't backup your files elsewhere else in the first place?

 

 

What's the point of an external HD if you don't use it as a backup? They have higher failure rates than internal HD. Your loss.

[Guest ruiagnelo]

...and let me guess, you didn't backup your files elsewhere else in the first place?

 

 

What's the point of an external HD if you don't use it as a backup? They have higher failure rates than internal HD. Your loss.

 

it's like 350 gb, i don't have any more space to put it. a few things are on my internal disk too, but not the majority.

i am always careful about the disk, never fell down, never got water and the error messages started like two weeks ago. it can't be that bad!

[Guest Richy]

chkdsk

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315265

[Guest ruiagnelo]

chkdsk

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315265

 

yea, that was the checking i was talking about. i started it but it was taking like years to progress and a warning of "some files may be deleted" made me quit. i think i better make a backup now, because i can ask a friend for another disk and then do the checkdisk. i think it might work.

[Guest Coalbucket PI]

Back up everything and reformat the disk, it solves most problems. If after that it turns out that it is some 'file error' you can just do the check for errors thing you mentioned and delete these vindictive and crafty files which so fervently seek to sully and besmirch your digital empire.

[Guest ruiagnelo]

Back up everything and reformat the disk, it solves most problems. If after that it turns out that it is some 'file error' you can just do the check for errors thing you mentioned and delete these vindictive and crafty files which so fervently seek to sully and besmirch your digital empire.

 

i hate to have such ridiculous amount of precious stuff in digital form that i can lose in a sec, but there's no other way. it's been too long so stop now. thanks for the suggestion mate

[Guest tv_party]

you could try using some utility to check the smart info on the drive. it's supposed to give some insight into the general mechanical soundness of the drive. I used a free trial of this to check out my drives. WD has something called data lifeguard tools that might do the same thing, but I haven't tried it.

[Ego]

Back up everything and reformat the disk, it solves most problems. If after that it turns out that it is some 'file error' you can just do the check for errors thing you mentioned and delete these vindictive and crafty files which so fervently seek to sully and besmirch your digital empire.

 

i hate to have such ridiculous amount of precious stuff in digital form that i can lose in a sec, but there's no other way. it's been too long so stop now. thanks for the suggestion mate

 

There is another way. 1TB will cost you about €100 these days. Keep everything double. When out of space, buy 2 external drives instead of 1. If you keep a single copy on a single drive, one day you might lose everything. It happens a lot.

[Bob Dylan]

There is another way. 1TB will cost you about €100 these days. Keep everything double. When out of space, buy 2 external drives instead of 1. If you keep a single copy on a single drive, one day you might lose everything. It happens a lot.

 

:ok: :ok: :ok:

 

The above a hundred times I must have said to people who buy an external HD only to put their files on and forget to back them up.

[sysyphus]

http://www.hdtune.com/

 

win

[skotosa]

Does it make loud horsey noises? If so its dieing and you should get a new one.

[Guest Coalbucket PI]

I don't know if anyone else has been using Time Machine on OSX but it's reeeeally good and has saved my sphincter on a couple of occasions

[Guest tht tne]

this is too little too late but i don't recommend western digital drives... seagate is superior imo

[Guest ruiagnelo]

this is too little too late but i don't recommend western digital drives... seagate is superior imo

 

i am very happy with the wd drive and i know of many people who also own one and they are satisfied as well. the problem with this one was caused by my distraction and because i stupidly used the small cable.

 

i wonder how other brands work tho. but i might not try another one in a near future.

[chaosmachine]

I don't know if anyone else has been using Time Machine on OSX but it's reeeeally good and has saved my sphincter on a couple of occasions

 

not sure how much I trust time machine. it feels slow and fragile (the technical implementation, as i understand it, is pretty scary). but it saved me having to reinstall osx when i corrupted my system fonts, so i guess it's not that bad.

[Guest pulsewarrior]

Run chkdsk /r at a command prompt. It could take hours/days to complete, just let it run. It will repair logical errors if it can, but it shouldn't delete anything. Once this finishes, pull a backup of the drive and get a new one.

 

If you are transferring things off of it and have logical corruption that prevents copying, you can just boot with say an Ubuntu LiveCD....you can read up and run DD from a terminal window and choose to ignore errors and write 0s to get what you can in one shot. Alternatively you can copy from the ubuntu gui, and at least it will let you skip corrupt files (as opposed to Windows where it usually terminates an entire copy/move process if it hits errors).

 

& get a utility and run DST tests

[Rubin Farr]

chkdsk

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315265

 

yea, that was the checking i was talking about. i started it but it was taking like years to progress and a warning of "some files may be deleted" made me quit. i think i better make a backup now, because i can ask a friend for another disk and then do the checkdisk. i think it might work.

 

i have had 2 WD ext drives fail on me in the last 3 yrs, and the last fuck up was bc it told me it needed to run CHKDSK bc some file info was missing. cut to the piece of shit deleting half the drive before i could unplug it. don't trust WD and don't trust Windows. definitely go for dual backups.

[Guest Blanket Fort Collapse]

I had a 1TB WD ext. HD die on me that was 2 weeks old... while I was reformatting... and it was my only backup of hundreds of hours of work..

 

k yeh I'm backing up my hard drive double in the next day or two max for sure..

[Guest ruiagnelo]

i still don't understand something:

if i eventually manage to successfuly do a backup (right now i thinking of burning dvds as it is cheaper and much more secure than getting another hard drive) and then format my current hd, will the hd be alright? i still don't understand if the problem is in the files or the actual hard drive..

[Ego]

Which filesystem are you using, FAT32 or NTFS?

 

Is this the message you're getting?

 

 

If so, this can probably be ignored (scan/fix shouldn't mess anything up), I think Windows shows it automatically when it detects you didn't unmount correctly. And only files that were written to while disconnecting the drive could get corrupted. But please, backup everything you need.

[Guest ruiagnelo]

Which filesystem are you using, FAT32 or NTFS?

 

Is this the message you're getting?

 

 

If so, this can probably be ignored (scan/fix shouldn't mess anything up), I think Windows shows it automatically when it detects you didn't unmount correctly. And only files that were written to while disconnecting the drive could get corrupted. But please, backup everything you need.

 

NTFS. Indeed, the exact same message appears.

So if i backup all the data to another hd, then format mine and move the files back again, will it be fixed? that's my only doubt now.

[Ego]

It's probably not hardware related. Moving your data back and forth won't change a thing. Just press scan and fix and you'll get this window.

 

 

And this is what happens when there is an error:

 

 

So it's not like you don't know what it did to your data. Instead, it'll help you figure out which files might be incomplete/corrupted.

 

Note: these errors are on an MP3 player and are caused by unplugging the player while copying.

[Guest ruiagnelo]

It's probably not hardware related. Moving your data back and forth won't change a thing. Just press scan and fix and you'll get this window.

 

 

And this is what happens when there is an error:

 

 

So it's not like you don't know what it did to your data. Instead, it'll help you figure out which files might be incomplete/corrupted.

 

Note: these errors are on an MP3 player and are caused by unplugging the player while copying.

 

i see. i will try that then. but being an amount of 300gb, it might take a while.

[spratters]

I have had this WD 500 gb portable hd for quite a long time and in the last months i noticed it sometimes unplugged with no reason at all, which i later came to associate with the use of a very small usb cable (about 25 centimeter long) that would cause this with sudden movements of the computer. only about two weeks ago, after i plug it, a message appeared mentioning errors on some files, and that same message shows now everytime i plug it.

it tells me to either check for errors, which i haven't done yet, because i know it will delete damaged files and i won't take the risk or either proceed with no checking, after which it runs normally.

 

i have more than a half of the full capacity with documents and of course music, that i really don't want to lose, so i am trying to solve this the right way. i know of people who plug their hds and get "need to format" messages, so i guess mine is not that bad.

 

i thought about doing a backup to other disk, then format mine and move the files again, but if the error is in the files, maybe that won't solve it. or maybe i should just do the checking, but i don't know exactly whay is damaged, so i am afraid of doing it.

 

suggestions?

 

 

What exactly are the error messages. They can usually be easily defeated.