[pchelpers] Re: SpinRite or Scandisk

Hi Don

> That some interesting info at that site about Scandisk. I have XP and I 
> have it do a check on my computer by Opening Windows explorer and R 
> Click on the C drive, choose properties and then tools and the Check Now 
> (not the defrag one), I then check both boxes and then ok. It then tells 
> me it can't do it till I reboot, I click ok and reboot and it does it's 
> thing, takes a little while. I've always assumed that this is XP's kinda 
> equivalent to the old Scandisk. It also give me no choices as to 
> whatever it finds or doesn't find.

Yes, it's the equivalent to ScanDisk, but it's a different program, and 
it has at least three different names during the process (Error-checking 
/ CheckDisk / DiskCheck) - MS is really losing it; what is Alzheimer 
called when it effects an entire corporation?

One of the differences is that one no longer seems to have the choice of 
at least easily getting a log of what was fixed, if any. (Event Viewer 
only gives a summary and apparently only for scans of C)

> At the Scandisk info site you gave me, he said he only runs it every 2-6 
> weeks, I've always run it more often. Am i doing something that is 
> unnecessary?

I've always heard that it depends on how often and how much you use your 
computer, and on how important the files you have on there are...
A good compromise between sloppiness and neuroticism seems to be doing 
the equivalent to standard (fix file system errors) once a month and the 
equivalent to thorough (fix file system errors + scan for bad sectors) 
every second month, but i usually end up having a bad conscience about 
doing it less often.

And contrary to what the guy said at http://www.qualitypc.net/Scandisk.htm
you should never run defrag unless you first checked for bad sectors. 
Even though modern hard disks rarely have bad sectors, chances are that 
Murphy will make defrag move part of the boot sector or your recent 
novel onto the only bad sector on your hard disk. If you run the 
thorough version first, it marks a bad sector as unusable and then that 
sector can't hurt you (and warns you that the whole HD might fail soon).

Ek



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