AnimeSuki Forums

Timeless Enigma · 2004-01-27, 01:58

Can electrostatic discharge cause gradual data loss/decay and/or data corruption on your hard drive?
Also, can gradual decay of data be halted by a low level reformat, or does this require a whole new hard drive?

SirJeannot · 2004-01-27, 07:13

if the discharge happens on the pcb, you can kill the controller, that's all.
if you manage to get a new one (on another hdd which is mechanically broken), your problem is solved

what do you call data loss? bad clusters spreading?
if it's that, then don't wait to low level format, it works almost every time

EtherNEZ · 2004-01-27, 19:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Timeless Enigma

Can electrostatic discharge cause gradual data loss/decay and/or data corruption on your hard drive?
Also, can gradual decay of data be halted by a low level reformat, or does this require a whole new hard drive?

Well, it depends on the kind of 'electrostatic discharge'. If it's a lightning bolt then I suspect the answer would be yes! Other than than that, as SirJeannot said.

Over extended periods of time, particularly if not used, the GMR (Giant Magneto Resistive) properties of the HDs will decay, this manifests itself as a loss of allignment of magnetic particles on the disk platter - hence loss of data integrity, although this is hardly a problem for HD's alone.

A low level format can reset this problem (temporarilly) however and if the HD is used continously, you are far more likely to see it suffer from drive mechanical failure (worn out stepper motor, drive motor or damaged R/W head caused by too many 'bumps' or restarts)

You'd really be better off buying a new HD though if any serious bad cluster problems start to occur- especially if they reoccur in the same place after a low level format.

SirJeannot - Are you sure about replacing the controller on an HD????

I can't imagine the average home user doing that!!! Surely that's the domain of the professional data recovery experts (with an obsenely high price tag attached as well) - unless that's what you mean.... or have you tried it?

Timeless Enigma · 2004-01-28, 03:10

I refer to data loss as losing 1000 mp3s and the remains of what was lost is a bunch of unremovable files with gibberish names. Also, I'm finding that my avis are getting corrupt and I have to constantly redl them through BT.

I happened to be a dumbass and I didn't properly ground myself while handling my new hard drive and connecting it to the comp. Now... I didn't feel any shocks, but I'm a bit suspicious. If this is actually the work of a virus or something, I can't do much about it at the moment, so I might as well low level format.

But the thing is, the drive was working perfectly (I installed it in August, then in December/January was when the bad stuff started to happen) I can't run Scandisk or Disk Defrag because of the corrupt files I cannot delete.

chris · 2004-01-28, 16:47

i have worked manny times with hard drives without grounding myself even though i know i should and i have a ground strap to somewhere, but i have never heard of something like this happeing, i am not shure what is happening with your system but it may help to run a virus scan using mcafee or norton also it could be your motherboard is messed but the first thing i would do is a virus scan and if u have a 2nd (old) comp you may want to see if u can read the files off the drive using it as a slave.

SirJeannot · 2004-01-30, 15:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by EtherNEZ

SirJeannot - Are you sure about replacing the controller on an HD????

I can't imagine the average home user doing that!!! Surely that's the domain of the professional data recovery experts (with an obsenely high price tag attached as well) - unless that's what you mean.... or have you tried it?

take a screw driver and don't have 2 left hands, that's all what's required :P

ameoba · 2004-01-31, 16:23

There's virtually no reason to ever low-level an IDE drive these days; it's done at the factory and that's good enough.

ESD generally isn't -that- much of a concern with HDDs; unless you're dancing with rubber shoes & polyesther pants on a cold dry day in the middle of the desert, you should be fine handling a HDD without any grounding.

The data's probably lost; It sucks losing your MP3s & videos, but it's not like having to recover your PhD Dissertation 3 days before your thesis defense. I wouldn't quite write the drive off yet; it could just be a software-level corruption of the file-system. The only way to be sure would be to reformat it & try again. Of course, most HDD manufacturers have some utility you can download (or comes on a CD with the drive) that'll do intense scans on the drive to see if it's good.

Zap · 2004-02-01, 13:36

Most hard drive manufacturers these days offer free utilities on their web sites for testing their brand of hard drives. The software can do a factory recertification, and if it finds errors will offer to attempt fixing them.

SirJeannot · 2004-02-01, 15:00

if you don't want to look around too much for these utilities, get the "ultimate boot cd"

very very very convenient

EtherNEZ · 2004-02-03, 07:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by SirJeannot

take a screw driver and don't have 2 left hands, that's all what's required :P

I guess I'm out of luck then....

Incidently, ever tried handling an HD while it's on? (an old corrupt one of course

) Those disk platters are fairly weighty and certainly spinning fast! Don't lose your balance!

This "Ultimate boot CD" i've seen mentioned many times. I think that's a good enough reason to investigate it. I've always made do with the individual manufacturer's utils for HD check ups which have saved me too on a couple of occasions.

2004-01-27, 01:58	Link #1
Timeless Enigma Tsushima Masaki Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: British Columbia, Canada	Some Questions on Hard Drives Can electrostatic discharge cause gradual data loss/decay and/or data corruption on your hard drive? Also, can gradual decay of data be halted by a low level reformat, or does this require a whole new hard drive? __________________

2004-01-27, 07:13	Link #2
SirJeannot AT Field Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: #animesuki Age: 14	if the discharge happens on the pcb, you can kill the controller, that's all. if you manage to get a new one (on another hdd which is mechanically broken), your problem is solved what do you call data loss? bad clusters spreading? if it's that, then don't wait to low level format, it works almost every time __________________ "facts Jeremy, facts!" - non factual Jeremy.

2004-01-28, 03:10	Link #4
Timeless Enigma Tsushima Masaki Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: British Columbia, Canada	I refer to data loss as losing 1000 mp3s and the remains of what was lost is a bunch of unremovable files with gibberish names. Also, I'm finding that my avis are getting corrupt and I have to constantly redl them through BT. I happened to be a dumbass and I didn't properly ground myself while handling my new hard drive and connecting it to the comp. Now... I didn't feel any shocks, but I'm a bit suspicious. If this is actually the work of a virus or something, I can't do much about it at the moment, so I might as well low level format. But the thing is, the drive was working perfectly (I installed it in August, then in December/January was when the bad stuff started to happen) I can't run Scandisk or Disk Defrag because of the corrupt files I cannot delete. __________________

2004-02-01, 15:00	Link #9
SirJeannot AT Field Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: #animesuki Age: 14	if you don't want to look around too much for these utilities, get the "ultimate boot cd" very very very convenient __________________ "facts Jeremy, facts!" - non factual Jeremy.

2004-01-28, 16:47	Link #5
chris [root@localhost]# IT Support Join Date: Dec 2003	i have worked manny times with hard drives without grounding myself even though i know i should and i have a ground strap to somewhere, but i have never heard of something like this happeing, i am not shure what is happening with your system but it may help to run a virus scan using mcafee or norton also it could be your motherboard is messed but the first thing i would do is a virus scan and if u have a 2nd (old) comp you may want to see if u can read the files off the drive using it as a slave.

2004-01-31, 16:23	Link #7
ameoba Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: albuquerque,nm	There's virtually no reason to ever low-level an IDE drive these days; it's done at the factory and that's good enough. ESD generally isn't -that- much of a concern with HDDs; unless you're dancing with rubber shoes & polyesther pants on a cold dry day in the middle of the desert, you should be fine handling a HDD without any grounding. The data's probably lost; It sucks losing your MP3s & videos, but it's not like having to recover your PhD Dissertation 3 days before your thesis defense. I wouldn't quite write the drive off yet; it could just be a software-level corruption of the file-system. The only way to be sure would be to reformat it & try again. Of course, most HDD manufacturers have some utility you can download (or comes on a CD with the drive) that'll do intense scans on the drive to see if it's good.

2004-02-01, 13:36	Link #8
Zap Junior Member Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Wisconsin	Most hard drive manufacturers these days offer free utilities on their web sites for testing their brand of hard drives. The software can do a factory recertification, and if it finds errors will offer to attempt fixing them.