SMART Failure not so smart

If you are out of warranty, just buy a new drive, copy your data over and throw out (destroy if it has personal data) the failing drive.

You don't 'fix' the error; you replace the drive.

Read the original post if you want to be helpful: "my hard drive is relatively new."  It works fine!!! It IS the replacement. The error message IS the problem.

If I had an active warranty, I would just email tech support. I can't seem to find the answer by googling. I hope to find the answer for free, thanks.

Hi,

We are trying to help here. This can happen to a new hard drive as well, even a new hard drive out of the box. You can try and reseating the hard drive, and try running diagnostics again to check if you get the error. If you do then the hard drive needs a replacement, that's the only fix.

I hope the below link helps.

support.dell.com/.../document

Thank you

Royan

Hi,

Your system has a failing hard drive. Replacing the hard drive is the fix.

Royan

Hi,

Welcome to the Community. Its a failing hard drive. If you have any data on your computer, this would be the right time to back them up until it lets you log in.

If you have an active warranty. Send me a Private message. Click on my user name, add me as a friend, and send me your service tag, phone number, and address.

Thank you

Royan

I think there must be a way to turn off the nag screen without unseating the hard drive. I'm not really familiar with doing that.

Dellcurt - Not that it's recommended but you could go into the system setup by pressing F2 as it boots (at the dell screen) and look in there to disable SMART reporting.  But as everyone else is telling you, the drive is telling you that it's dying.  This is not a matter of if your drive goes so bad you lose everything, but when the drive goes bad that you lose everything.  

I went into F2 and looked around. I was not able to determine which one disables it. That's my question. Everybody's drive dies eventually, but this one is not dying now. Again, it's relatively new, and I've been getting the nag screen for months. Terry, you're the one who is not listening, not me. Does anyone know where to go after pressing F2. I downloaded the BIOS guide, but I don't have the same options as what's described in it. There is no way to set Internal HDD to Auto, in order to drop the list to disable the SMART failure notice. Why is my BIOS different than the one described in the manual?

Not able to upload a picture here. Oh well. I can't use a mouse there.

Some of the headings are: Intel SpeedStep, Integrated NIC, SATA operation, Adapter Warnings, Function Key Behavior, and Turbo Mode... Is it any of those?

Sorry if you thought I was saying you're not listening, I was just trying to reinforce the when and not if.  I'm not sure what the BIOS in your system looks like as Dell has a few different types, but if you have one that you can use the mouse in it may be under drives.  I tried look around the support pages to see if I could find a picture of the system setup but I haven't found one yet.  If you have the option to turn it off, generally you'll have a specific entry that says SMART Reporting and you can just turn it off or on.  Otherwise maybe you could post a picture of what you have in your Setup so that I can see it and possibly help further.

Hi

If you don't believe the Dell man who almost certainly knows what is up, try scanning the drive or using a backup prog.  If the problem is the same as on my pc - and it sounds like it - the pc will crash proving him right.

Regards

Kev

A delayed response.  Several free programs allow you to examine the SMART data kept in flash memory on the drive.  One is Defraggler.  Install it and click on the health tab.  The elements in the SMART data are somewhat self-explanatory.  If there is even ONE defective sector, the drive needs to be replaced.