What Is Hard Drive Failure?

Hard drive failure can be a disaster as all the data on the disk can be lost suddenly without any precaution. However, hard drive failures do have signs. If you pay attention to them and do the prevention measures beforehand, you may avoid the annoying data loss caused by hard drive failure.

Some users may don't know what hard drive failure is. So, in the first place, I will illustrate you what hard drive failure is and its consequences to your computer.

What Is Hard Drive Failure

Generally speaking, there are two types of hard drive failures: physical and logical. For physical hard drive failure, it means the hard disk or one of its components has become physically damaged or stops working entirely, which could lead to Windows boot issues and data loss.

For logical hard drive failure, there are no mechanical issues on the hard drive but the hard drive may fail to function normally or satisfactorily, as the damage occurs in a hard drive's file structure or software rather than the internal hard disk. When a logical hard drive failure occurs, files may be inaccessible or disappeared. In other cases, the computer operating system may have been corrupted.

Normally, a typical lifespan for a hard drive is 3-5 years with normal use. The most vulnerable drives are old electromechanical devices that store data on fast-spinning disk. But sometimes, your hard drive may crash no matter how long it has been used.

SSD will fail as well, but it happens less frequently. Luckily, many hard drives will show indications that there is a problem before the full crash. If you are worried that your hard drive is failing, check if your hard drive shows the following symptoms. Here are some hard drive failure signs that can indicate hard drive failure.

Symptom 1. Frequent Computer Freezes, and Crashes

If you find your computer freezes and crashes like the Blue Screen of Death issue frequently, it is possibly caused by your hard drive. And if it occurs after a fresh installation, it is very likely due to bad hardware, and possibly a failing hard drive.

There are many causes of computer freezes and crashes, but it also indicates hard drive failure coming soon. Under this situation, you can copy your important data to an external hard drive in case of accidental hard drive failure.

Symptom 2. Missing Files or Files Failed to Open

One of the typical signs of hard drive failure is files suddenly disappeared or failed to open. If you find some files fail to open and are corrupted even though they were saved without errors OR if some files suddenly disappear, you should stay alert and take action. The data stored on the hard drive should be recovered and transferred to a safe place.

Symptom 3. Consuming Excessive Time to Access Folders and Files

Really long wait time to access folders and files is also a sign of hard drive failure, which is due to the failing areas of the hard drive requiring repeated read attempts before successful access. However, this can be also caused by many other computer issues, but it is also a typical sign of hard drive failure.

Symptom 4. A Rising Number of Bad Sectors

A rising number of bad sectors can be a sign of a failing hard drive. A bad sector is a disk sector on a disk storage unit that is permanently damaged. Once damaged, all information stored on the sector will be lost. Accumulated bad sectors are a sign of hard drive failure and they are hard to identify. When large amounts of your disk are currently in use, the data stored on the disk could be in danger.

Some users may ask: how do I know if my hard drive has bad sectors? Normally, when you perform some specific operations or open some files, your computer is significantly running slow or the disk is ticking. This can indicate that there are some bad sectors on your hard disk, we can provide expertise diagnostic please call us at 301-288-1144