Hi guys,

I have a problem with my Portable 5TB HDD, CrystalDiskInfo says: "Health Status: Caution, C5 Current Pending Sector Count - Raw Values: 000000000031".

This Portable 5TB HDD is never moved and is always stationary, it has NEVER been dropped and I 'handle it with care' so to say, I've had it for around 13 months.

10 days ago I restored an Image with Acronis, and I made a mistake: I forgot to take out/un-plug my Portable 5TB HDD during the 'restore Image' process, so I am 99% sure this is the cause for this problem.
Since then I copied 3 videos on the Portable 5TB HDD, I noticed the problem when I watched 1 of the videos - it had 10-15 sec freezes hmm, so I thought something is wrong, I tried to copy the 3 videos from the Portable 5TB HDD to my Internal SSD and 2 of the videos copied OK, but 1 video could NOT copy and said 'cyclic redundancy check error' or something similar, and then I opened CrystalDiskInfo.

My initial thinking is to backup everything from my Portable 5TB HDD, and then make a full format, and after that I don't know if this Portable 5TB HDD will be reliable to use any more.
I have some new data on it that I like to save.

So I wanted to ask you guys for advice.
1. Did I do physical damage to my Portable 5TB HDD, by leaving it plugged-in while I restored an Image with Acronis?
2. What is the best course of action to do now from this point onward?
3. Will this Portable 5TB HDD be reliable to use again? Or I should buy a new one?

This problem arose either when you saved these videos to the hard drive or while the drive was automatically optimizing storage space for the new video files. Either the hard drive failed to write the data correctly, the writing process was interrupted, or the drive already had damage in the specific area where the data was written.

If you need to copy files that won't copy due to a data error, use Unstoppable Copier or NonStopCopy.

1: These hard drives automatically unload their heads less than a second after the computer stops accessing the drive, so no, that couldn't have damaged it. Admittedly, these are SMR drives that perform maintenance tasks during idle periods, but in any case, you would have needed to impact the drive while it was actively processing data to cause damage.

2: Continue using the hard drive but avoid storing important data on it - or at least try to prevent a situation where essential data exists in only a single copy located on that drive. You could completely wipe the drive to eliminate the errors, though that doesn't guarantee they won't return. It depends on what caused the errors. If the hard drive simply failed to write the data, the errors won't reappear; however, if the drive is already damaged, the damage could spread and eventually lead to failure. Alternatively, if the damage is minor, the drive will automatically replace the corrupted sectors with spare ones and continue to operate without issues. Until the hard drive decides that the bad sectors need to be remapped, it will continue to corrupt data.

3: If you can afford to buy a new hard drive, then do so. Choose a model - or a retailer - that offers long-term warranty coverage (ideally three years or more), given how frequently you use the drive. There is no guarantee it will actually be replaced under warranty if it fails, but considering your current drive started having issues after just a year, it is better to have that protection.

Often times, a small number of pending errors is due to some fluke event rather than something actually wrong with the platter media. You can always write zeroes, then re-test and see what happens. You can also write zeros only to the blocks being reported instead of the whole drive.