“I was recently moving into a new home and managed to accidentally drop my computer in the process. My computer now refuses to read anything off of the hard drive and losing all of this data has been catastrophic. Outside of being more careful, how can I prevent disk failure from happening in the future? The amount of data I lost has really got me worried about hard drives failing on my other computers.”

--Marcos C.

Ouch! There is nothing worse, in the computer world, then unexpectedly losing a hard drive. Losing such large amounts of personal data is always a potential risk and should serve as a reminder to always have a backup system for your files. It is likely that the hard drive in your computer was a standard SATA disk and the drop caused a “head crash”. A “head crash” is when the magnetic read-and-write head of the hard drive collides with the actual disk, which ruins the surface and prevents the disk from reading properly. It is possible that the disk is recoverable, but you would have to pay to have it fixed by a professional and the disk is more likely permanently damaged.

There are several key signs to look for on older hard drives to spot potential damage and prevent failures in the future. If your old hard drives become excessively noisy and access times begin to slow dramatically, it may be the perfect time to either backup your system or start shopping for a new hard drive altogether. Another sign to look for when spotting failing hard drives are computer crashes; if your computer tends to crash unexpectedly or, on windows, display the dreaded “blue screen of death” on a regular basis it may be time to swap out your drive. Hard drives can also be directly affected by spyware and malware viruses, which can cause corruption and destroy the device.

When purchasing a new hard drive, consider buying a newer solid state drive (SSD) model. These type of hard drives use flash memory, making them much quicker to read and write from. Another benefit of a SSD is that they contain almost no moving parts and thereby more able to withstand accidental impact. It is important to remember that all drives get old and no hard drive is immune to failure. The best way to prevent the loss of data is to backup all of your files regularly and properly maintain your drives. Be sure to pay close attention to your hard drives speed, heat levels and keep them far away from any outside magnetic sources which could erase or destroy your disks.