Bad Data Block on Hard-Drive?

[jmine83]

I recently went into a local Mac Store that accepts old MacBook Pro trade-ins for store credit. As part of their trade-in evaluation procedure, they have their technicians thoroughly test the performance of the machine and probe for any serious problems. Fortunately, everything tested fine "except" they are reporting that the hard-drive has one bad data block which is enough for them to not be able to accept my trade-in in the computer's current condition. They will accept it once the hard-drive gets replaced. Ever since I've owned my MacBook Pro that I bought new in July 2010, I've never had any problems with the computer. I realize of course a critical problem can arise with a computer the older it gets if used on daily, regular basis and I know I am no longer under warranty. I have no problem buying a new hard-drive for my MacBook Pro and installing it myself to save part and labor costs, but I want to verify for myself the claim that there is a bad data block on my hard-drive.

What software is best recommend for evaluating the integrity of a hard-drive that I can run myself to verify this problem? I would strongly prefer freeware solutions please or something extremely cheap.

 

[S.B.G]

I recently went into a local Mac Store that accepts old MacBook Pro trade-ins for store credit. As part of their trade-in evaluation procedure, they have their technicians thoroughly test the performance of the machine and probe for any serious problems. Fortunately, everything tested fine "except" they are reporting that the hard-drive has one bad data block which is enough for them to not be able to accept my trade-in in the computer's current condition. They will accept it once the hard-drive gets replaced. Ever since I've owned my MacBook Pro that I bought new in July 2010, I've never had any problems with the computer. I realize of course a critical problem can arise with a computer the older it gets if used on daily, regular basis and I know I am no longer under warranty. I have no problem buying a new hard-drive for my MacBook Pro and installing it myself to save part and labor costs, but I want to verify for myself the claim that there is a bad data block on my hard-drive.

What software is best recommend for evaluating the integrity of a hard-drive that I can run myself to verify this problem? I would strongly prefer freeware solutions please or something extremely cheap.

I highly recommend Spinrite. If you have access to an IBM PC, take the HDD out of your Mac and put it in the PC and run the DOS-based program Spinrite. It's a great HDD recovery and maintenance tool. It will detect and repair or mark bad sectors on any HDD.

Below is my MBP HDD in an old Dell PC with Spinrite running on it.

 

[jmine83]

I highly recommend Spinrite. If you have access to an IBM PC, take the HDD out of your Mac and put it in the PC and run the DOS-based program Spinrite. It's a great HDD recovery and maintenance tool. It will detect and repair or mark bad sectors on any HDD.

Below is my MBP HDD in an old Dell PC with Spinrite running on it.

WOW. Thank you so much for the very quick response. I have another question to ask related to this matter. To replace the hard drive in the MacBook Pro (2010 model), it simply needs to be an internal laptop SATA hard drive correct? Does brand matter at all? The cheap ones I see are Seagate and Western Digital brands if they will work. I have also heard of many other SATA variations like SATA II, SATA III, mSATA, eSATA, etc. Please clarify for me if SATA variation matters.

 

[S.B.G]

WOW. Thank you so much for the very quick response. I have another question to ask related to this matter. To replace the hard drive in the MacBook Pro (2010 model), it simply needs to be an internal laptop SATA hard drive correct? Does brand matter at all? The cheap ones I see are Seagate and Western Digital brands if they will work. I have also heard of many other SATA variations like SATA II, SATA III, mSATA, eSATA, etc. Please clarify for me if SATA variation matters.

The last time I checked, a standard 2.5" HDD is what they use. At least that's what my 2006 MBP model was. You can look up your specific model at OWC and it will show you what fits and works with it.

I think I put a Seagate in mine and it has traditionally been a good drive for many people.

 

[Rafa33]

Did you try this for Mac data recovery?

Hey!

I got another efficient recovery software to recover Mac files on my computer by searching into Google which can be easily visited and downloaded here:

http://www.recovermacfiles.net/

Download:


http://www.recovermacfiles.net/download/recovermacfiles.zip