WDC WD7500AADS-00M2B0

[CrimsonW]

Sometimes when I try to copy files on it the speed goes to 2-3mb/s and just stops there and wont even continue at the speed, I tested it with western digital lifeguard , with the tools from windows 7, with hdd regenerator and I didnt find any errors. In hdd regenerator at the begining it 7-8mb were tested and then few seconds stoped , and againg 7-8mb and another few seconds the test stoped. I formated, I wrote the mbr again and nothing.. it still has moments when I cant copy anything on him and moments when the copying speed is about 80-100 mb/s. Also crystaldiskinfo say Health Ok, but it has about 11000 hours power on. Is there anything I can do about it ? How much until I cant use it at all ?

[Vulcan]

How much until I cant use it at all ?

That's impossible to answer - none of us can forsee the future However from your description, IMHO the behaviour will only get worse...

a) What are you trying to achieve? It seems like you formatted the disk, so you don't care about data recovery - just to try to use the disk again. Is that correct?

b) Please supply the full raw SMART data from the disk. That should give us a clue about the disk's view of its own state.

c) Did you check the Windows system event log for any errors being logged, especially at the times when you get actual errors on the Windows GUI / desktop?

IMHO the likely result of the investigation, is that the disk is sick due to internal problems that you cannot fix yourself.

P.S. Don't run HDD Regenerator, if you care about the data on the disk.

[CrimsonW]

How can I obtain full raw SMART data ?

[Vulcan]

How can I obtain full raw SMART data ?

Many utilities can do this (HDDScan, MHDD, smartmontools etc.). I think that crystaldiskinfo (which you say you've used) can also supply this info. I don't have that utility, so here is my best guess about how to use that - if this info is wrong, then use one of my other suggested utilities or get help from elsewhere:

On this page from their website:

http://crystalmark.info/software/Crysta ... index.html

... you need to send us all of the attribute values for your disk, equivalent to those shown at the bottom of the left hand screenshot. You can try viewing that screen for your disk, then doing edit -> copy (to get the text into the clipboard), then edit->paste into a posting to this board, or into a text document attachment.

The main points are that the column of "raw value" is needed, as well as the other three (current / worst / threshold), and that all attribute values need to be included (notice how you can't see them all on that screenshot, as some have scrolled off the bottom of the window).

[CrimsonW]

This is what you needed?

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[Vulcan]

This is what you needed?

Yes thanks. Very interesting - I see no indications of the disk noticing that it has a problem... (I see just the common excessive load/unload cycle count, due to the idle timeout period being too short - but that would not affect speed during a file copy, for example.)

Therefore please reply to my earlier questions (a) & (c) and also I am adding these questions:

d) What is the history to this situation? Has this disk always been installed in this PC? What has changed in that configuration shortly before this behaviour started?

e) I suggest you run a graphical read benchmark on the disk, and look at the shape of the graph. Are there any significant "dips" (slow speed sections)? If you repeat the test, are the dips always in the same place (same LBAs)? Slow areas of the disk (i.e. internal disk problems) will usually appear as "dips" reading the same LBAs when the test is repeated. Problems caused elsewhere (e.g. slow system, SATA I/O problems etc.) will usually cause "dips" in performance to appear at different places (different LBAs), when the test is repeated.

Based on that SMART data from the disk, there might be no problem with it (although such a problem cannot be completely excluded in this situation). That is why I am suggesting to look for other evidence. Another simple approach is to move that disk to another system, and put another disk into that system - does the "slowness" move with the disk into another system? Or does the "slowness" stay with the existing system, even when testing another disk?

I hope that gives you some ideas about how you can make progress with diagnosis

[CrimsonW]

Well the thing is that I just bought it from someone, I could return it to him , but it was a fair price especially now with the overpriced market and I really need some storage to clean my other hard disks and a bluray writer its not in the plan right now. The strange thing is that I just saw crystal saying that another of my harddisk has a problem but I never had any errors copying or accessing the data from that one.

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[CrimsonW]

I never had any problem with other disks on my sistem, including some wd. The hdd regenerator test I did it on another computer, so there were problems there too with the "slowness"

[Vulcan]

I never had any problem with other disks on my sistem, including some wd. The hdd regenerator test I did it on another computer, so there were problems there too with the "slowness"

You are choosing not to answer several of my questions - that's fine, it's your issue, so you investigate it as much as you want to. I will just say that, from your comment above, the cause of the slowness now seems clear. Some of my previous suggestions would help you to confirm your answer above, if you want to.

Good luck with whatever you choose to do!

[CrimsonW]

The 250gb disk , the one that its showing me that it has problems was disconnected when I used the 750gb western digital and experienced the problems I told you about.

a) Im trying to use the disk to store data for short periods of time ( 1-2 month)

b) I showed the raw smart data

c) The only error I found in event log when I was using the hard disk was: "The description for Event ID 6 from source HDD Info Service cannot be found. Either the component that raises this event is not installed on your local computer or the installation is corrupted. You can install or repair the component on the local computer.

If the event originated on another computer, the display information had to be saved with the event.

The following information was included with the event:

OnFreeSpaceChange event can't be fired. Error = 0x800706BA. Original error message:
The RPC server is unavailable.


the message resource is present but the message is not found in the string/message table"

d) I told you the history , I had problems only when I conected this hard disk.

e) I didnt run a graphical read benchmark on the disk yet, can you tell me a good soft which I could use to do this ?

Thanks.

[CrimsonW]

I just can use it like this..the problem its getting worse.. how can I break it so on the test it will show that its bad ? It still has warranty at western digital so they will replace it but its needed to apear bad at their tests.

[networks]

Have you ran the Western Digital Diagnostics on the drive ? If the short test fails you have the needed info to get an RMA if it passes run the extended test see if it fails that test.

[CrimsonW]

I did, and there were no errors... everything was fine.

[Vulcan]

Thanks for those missing answers. Your answer to question (c) was a surprise, so I need you to explain again... When you said:

Sometimes when I try to copy files on it the speed goes to 2-3mb/s and just stops there and wont even continue at the speed

Did the copying actually fail (e.g. Windows error message appeared on the desktop) at that point where you said the copying stops, or not? I thought you meant that the copying did fail (according to Windows), but your answer to question (c) means that it did not fail. Therefore I am confused. Please explain what you meant.

Regarding a graphical benchmark utility - one example of such a program is HDTach.

[CrimsonW]

It didnt fail, just stuck there, I let it about 10 minutes and nothing the size remained to copy was the same even after that time and the speed also was the same , the whole computer stucked when I tried to cancel it. The other days it sometimes worked with ending the process form task manager and trying to copy another file and then trying to copy the file at which the hard disk stucked. The files at which it stucks are random, even the size is from about few mb to above 10gb. I tried it on an external rack too and the problem its the same. I can send it to be replaced but it wont be if they dont find any problems with the softs they are using to test it.

[Vulcan]

It didnt fail, just stuck there, I let it about 10 minutes and nothing the size remained to copy was the same even after that time

Thanks for explaining, it is clear now. I expect that the disk, and Windows drivers, were both doing retries, which caused these long delays.

I can send it to be replaced but it wont be if they dont find any problems with the softs they are using to test it.

I understand - you seem to have one of the (relatively rare, in my experience) types of disk fault, where the problem is not bad enough to be shown in the usual places (e.g. SMART data, WD DLG testing, OS error log).

A while ago, I had some (non-WD) disks (in large arrays) with a similar problem. The good news with them was that, eventually, they did start to reallocate the slow sectors, and so the problem became visible enough that the manufacturer could not deny it any more.

I can only suggest two things for you to try:

- Perform file copies using Windows as you have been doing, and when they stop leave them "stuck". You may have to leave the computer like that for a long time. The point is that, eventually, we hope that either (a) Windows logs an error message (that gives you some evidence to show there is a problem, although its cause could be disputed by a disk supplier) and/or (b) the disk starts to mark one or more sectors as "pending reallocation", so that they show in the SMART data. You will need to regularly check the SMART data, to look for changes.

- As networks said, use the WD DLG Extended Test (this one reads the whole disk surface). You may need to do this many, many times. Again, we hope for one of the two things I mentioned above - either read errors, or increasing numbers of sectors pending reallocation (which will eventually cause WD DLG to report an error).

I hope that your disk will, eventually, degrade some more, in order to get the evidence that you need to allow for a replacement. That is what happened in my cases

It would be possible to try setting fewer internal read retries (actually a lower retry timeout) on the disk. However I am not suggesting that option here, as I cannot promise that WD would accept your disk as faulty if you get errors after doing that change.

[CrimsonW]

Thank for the info.