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My hd has "449 defective sectors", although system says it's "ok". What does that mean and what should I do to solve the problem? Thanks!

Pablo Gonzalez
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  • Do you think that 449 defective sectors is "ok" to trust your data upon? I don't. – user535733 Mar 15 '20 at 18:24
  • Before I make any recommendations, I need to see screenshot(s) of the SMART Data window in the Disks application. Do you have good backups of your important files? How old is the disk, and the computer? Start comments to me with @heynnema or I may miss them. – heynnema Mar 15 '20 at 20:43

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Immediately backup any important data (documents, pictures, music, etc.), shut down the PC, then replace the hard drive. You will most likely need to reinstall your OS from scratch on the new drive.

If you want to take the risk, you can use a backup utility to create a custom image to install your OS with all your packages and configurations intact, but you will still need to manually backup your files first. With that many bad sectors I wouldn't recommend it, though, as it may cause the image to become corrupt.

449 is a very high number of defective sectors and is definitely a cause for concern.

This is why it is a good idea to regularly run full backups of your system.

EDIT: Personally I would recommend installing an SSD instead. Nowadays they are almost as cheap as HDDs, much faster than HDDs, and are much less susceptible to physical failures like this.

Leah96xxx
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