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My desktop PC (Sony Vaio..Platform: Windows XP SP2 (WinNT 5.01.2600)
MSIE: Internet Explorer v7.00 (7.00.5730.0011)
is about 5 years old and I have noticed it runs much slower as the months go by despite regular monthly maintenance repairs (e.g. Scandisk, DeFrag, Registry Mechanic, Anti-Virus Scans, Anti-Spyware Scans like Adaware and SpyBot, etc, etc).
Recently I ran a free Diagnostic Tool ("SpeedFan 4.31") which "warned" me that I have a very large number of "Reallocated Sectors" and recommended that I repair or replace my Hard Drive.
I was wondering what my options would be instead of replacing the Hard Drive altogether. For example, is there any way I can "repair" these sectors in question? Also, would it be helpful if I did a complete "reformat" of my Hard Drive, (i.e. if I did a complete "Reformat" of my Hard Drive, would these sectors be repaired in the process of reformatting.)?
Here are the details of my Hard Drive:
Manufacturer=Seagate; Drive Capacity=78 GB
Cylinders:=16,383; Heads:=16;
Sectors per Track:= 63; TOTAL LBA SECTORS:=156,301,488
Here is the exact verbage that "SpeedFan" created for me in a report that Diagnosed my Hard Drive:
"Your hard disk has 517 reallocated sectors (this value is very large and your hard disk should be replaced. Hard disks do have spare sectors (usually from 256 up to 1024) used to replace bad ones. This remapping operation is transparent to the end user. Anyway, this can lead to degradated performances (because remapped sectors are in different places of the disk than the original ones and the head needs additional moving). If reallocated sectors grow over time, you might encounter some serious troubles.
NOTE: Your hard disk has 8 pending sectors. Those are sectors that couldn't be properly read and the the hard disk logic is waiting for a write operation to try to remap to a spare sector (if available). According to the Reallocated Sector Count attribute, your hard disk seems to have available sectors. A simple disk surface scan won't be enough to force the remap operation. You need a read/write surface scan to remap the sector. The best option should be a tool that knows about what should be read from that sector so that is has some option to apply the best fix to the missing data. "
SO HERE ARE MY BASIC QUESTIONS: Do you have any suggestions of a Tool that can perform the above diagnostic and repair function suggested? Would a regular Windows XP "scandisk" function help at all? Would it help if I did a total Reformat of my Hard Drive? Or do I need to replace the Hard Drive altogether? The report mentioned that other than the "Reallocated Sector Count" my Hard Drive is in excellent condition and was given a 94% Performance Rating.
Thanks for any help or suggestion.
