Reallocated sectors

[Ollie]

Hi all,

Got the latest FW installed with the hard drive reporting via web if.

Seems like nearly every day the hard drive error banner appears when i first open webif and the reallocated sector count has increased by one. Its now standing at 72.

I was just wondering if this is an acceptable level and rate of reallocation or if indicating the disk is getting on a bit and mite need a hip replacement or zimmer frame.

Of course, before the hard drive tools were added I wouldn't have known about it so it could be perfectly normal.

Cheers.

 

[Black Hole]

One does not normally expect sectors to be reallocated on a regular basis. How old is it?

 

[Ollie]

Erm it must be getting on for nearly 3 years I think so wouldn't be surprised if the drive was getting tired.
Are they IDE or SATA drives and is there any limitations or anything specific a new drive needs to be if i did swap the old one out (such at max 1Tb, 7200rpm etc etc)

 

[Black Hole]

Take a look at af123's disk swap blog on the Wiki HERE (click); you only need to do the hard stuff for drives larger than 1TB (you can just format a new drive using the Humax menus otherwise), but the advice about drive types is relevant.

 

[MartinLiddle]

Erm it must be getting on for nearly 3 years I think so wouldn't be surprised if the drive was getting tired.
Are they IDE or SATA drives and is there any limitations or anything specific a new drive needs to be if i did swap the old one out (such at max 1Tb, 7200rpm etc etc)

72 reallocated sectors on a three year old drive sounds pretty good to me. I wouldn't be worrying unduly. The drives are SATA II and maximum capacity that the kernel can support is 2TB. It is preferable to fit a drive optimised for PVR usage. See http://wiki.hummy.tv/wiki/2TB_Disk_Installation_Blog for more information

 

[fenlander]

The Seagate Pipeline drives seem to have been discontinued and supply is getting short. Any recommendations for suitable alternatives?

(My reallocated sectors count has gone from 250 to 252 and 256 in the last few weeks...)

 

[Ollie]

Cheers guys, it wasn't the amount of sectors that was worrying me as much as the steady increase (and having to keep clearing the banner on webif).
That said the drive is performing just as well as it always has, and nothing saved is mission critical so Il add drive replacement on to the long term 'to-do' list and see how it goes.
Might disable the time shifting buffer as well since i never need it so no point writing to the disk for no reason.

Thanks for all the advice.