How to know if hard disk is dying

[aicul]

My mbp is showing some sever signs of disctress, namely slow and some applications just crash.

This has only really started since the 10.6.6 upgrade, so I do not know if the problem is software or hardware.

I would like to eliminate hardware before I spent a very long time (remember the mbp is slow) trying to install 10.6.7

Disk utility verify and authorization fix reveal things are "ok". I run these using the mbp original install disk.

I have connected the mbp in T-mode and connected it to another mac, but hen I transfer files there re many i/o errors.

Is there any test, check, analysis I can do to determine if the hard disk is really dud?

 

[Jolly Giant]

some things that may help:

run Apple Hardware Test

get DiskWarrior and/or Tech Tool Pro

 

[aicul]

Ok, tried the hardware test and ran it, both in simple and advanced mode.

Seems my hardware is ok, but it is not clear i f the hard-disk is included in the test.

Other options look interesting, but am somewhat taken back from spending $100 just to check, at that price, I can buy a new hard disk and recover from timemachine.

thanks for input

 

[euphoria47]

may be a long shot, but you can copy your hard drive as clone to another using carboncopycloner, format your drive and clone it back. I have had to do this for different reasons, but found everything was unfragmented and efficient after. What model is it?

 

[NickZac]

Clone it ASAP; technologies like SMART are not accurate whatsoever and IIRC all of these technologies only predict about half of HDD failures. If you don't already, buy an external that uses a 2.5 inch drive that will fit in the MBP, as you then have both an external for backup, and drive you can install and use to boot off of if your HDD fails outright. If it starts to click, throw it out.

 

[aicul]

Thanks ALL

I opted for a hard drive replacement and use of TC for the data recovery