Re: [PLUG] Has my disk gone bad?

[edgee@goppelt.net]

Quoting Bill Jonas <bill@billjonas.com>:

> On Fri, Nov 10, 2000 at 09:31:00AM -0400, Ed G. wrote:
> > My disk has about 110,000 files in it.  Can I safely conclude from 
> > two known bad files that the disk is roasted or is this an 
> > "acceptable" rate of failure?  How common is it in your experience 
> > for small bits of the disk drive to fail, rather than a single 
> > catastrophic failure that leaves you unable to boot up?
> 
> Hmm...  I would suspect memory, first.  These same kind of symptoms

Well, you were right on the money about it's not being the disk.  Shortly after
I received your email, my computer went belly up--wouldn't even turn on.   
After a motherboard transplant, all is well and the "corrupted" files have gone
back to their uncorrupted state.

> of memory) that were in a marginal state to fail.  The corruption of a
> few
> binaries most likely resulted from those files being cached in a bad
> part
> of memory (I copied the binaries over from another Debian 2.2 box, and
> they
> worked fine then, although it was suggested by my boss that I could have
> simply touch'd the files).

This hadn't occurred to me, but it makes sense.  After I replaced the
motherboard, I went back and looked at the corrupted file, and wonder of
wonders, it wasn't corrupted any more!
 
> I'd try using memtest86 or some other memory tester before you replace
> the
> disk.

Thanks for the tip.  Can you recommend any disk diagnostic software for linux,
something that would really exercise the drive and (hopefully) cause a marginal
drive to fail?

Ed G.

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