I understand that Gibson Research (grc.com I think) apparently produces a
program called Spinrite which is reputed to be able to repair bad sectors.
However, it's alarmingly expensive, even tho it's only about 300k, and they
don't have a trial or demo version, so I can't vouch for it's efficacy. If
anyone can tell me where I can find a useable demo or such, perhaps you'd be
kind enough to mail me privately?

Further to bad sectors, here's an interesting item.  There's a program
called Stealthdisk which is aimed at enabling one to hide a folder on a hard
drive.  The folder simply disappears until the magic hot key is pressed,
causing the hidden folder to magically re-appear.

I sent a demo to a colleague of mine, who discovered that the program seems
to work by telling Windows (and DOS) that the file location is actually a
bad sector.  This is OK, and the program works well, but if Stealthdisk is
uninstalled without first 'un-hiding' the secret folder, the OS continues to
see the area as unuseable, and thereafter will report bad sectors.

Ian Porter
Computer Guys
Arrowtown
New Zealand
[log in to unmask]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris Simants" Subject: [PCBUILD] Bad Sectors on HD


> A friend gave me a HardDrive that "Crashed", his system(win98, P4 1.6ghz
256mg) was about 6 months old.  He ran into a mobo problem(not sure what it
was), and he assumed that it caused bad sectors on the hd(I don't really
know). So I said I'd take it and do some research. I ran Scan Disk/Defrag
and found a total of 3 bad sectors. I have always wondered if there was
something out there that would remove these bad sectors. (figured I'd ask!)
It is a 20-GB 5M Ultra ATA Fujitsu IDE U100 Hard Disk.  Is there any way to
save this poor drive.(I would like to use it as a back up).

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