Here are 5 free software to check hard drive health.
These software are handy to generate the status report of your hard disk drive (HDD) health. It is done by testing the various attributes of S.M.A.R.T (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) of your hard disk. You will see the current value, threshold, and worst value for hard disk’s spin up/down time, seek error rate, bad sectors, power cycle count, start and stop count, throughput performance, etc. Most of these software also show detailed information of your HDD. So these software are handy for both experts as well as for regular users. Let’s start with the first software named as ‘HDD Guardian’.
HDD Guardian
HDD Guardian is one of the best software in this list to check hard drive health and Solid State Drive (SSD) health. It checks for all possible S.M.A.R.T attributes to generate the accurate status of hard disk health. For every single attribute, it shows threshold, current value, and worst value. An easy to understand definition of every single attribute is also provided, which makes it more useful. You will also see the graph to check the threshold and the current condition of your hard disk drive.
Many other features are also provided by this advanced disk health checker software: full information of the hard drive, disk partitions, set read/write options, show warnings if hard disk temperature or any other parameter of HDD exceeds the threshold, etc. Its setup file is around 3 MB in size.
Here is the full review.
HDDExpert
HDDExpert is another handy software in this list that shows the health status of your hard disk drive by performing various tests. You will be able to find out the raw read error rate, start/stop count, seek time performance, spin-up retry count, and various other S.M.A.R.T attributes. Report of all tests can also be exported to PC as a text file for later use.
You will also see the crucial information of your hard disk: Firmware, Serial No, capacity, Cache size, Model No, and Manufacturer. This lightweight software (less than 2 MB) is pretty useful for a detailed hard disk analysis.
Note: Be careful while installing this software. It will prompt for the installation of third-party tool, but you can skip that tool using Decline button.
Click here to check the full review.
PassMark DiskCheckup
PassMark DiskCheckup (or simply DiskCheckup) is free for personal use and a very good HDD monitor software. All the S.M.A.R.T attributes are calculated automatically and status of every single attribute for your hard disk drive is also visible on its interface.
Apart from this, it also comes with Disk SelfTest feature which will help to find out if your hard disk drive contains any error or not. You can also select short or extended test option to use this feature. However, this feature can be used only if your HDD supports SelfTest specification.
Other important features supported by this software are: detailed information of HDD, S.M.A.R.T history, and option to export the data to PC as a plain text file. It is only 1.58 MB in size.
You can also read its full review.
EASIS Drive Check
EASIS Drive Check (free for private use) is also a good software to perform S.M.A.R.T test and Sector test for your hard disk. Results are visible on its interface and status of each attribute is also visible. Interesting feature of this software is that you can also configure your email address to send the report. If this feature didn’t work for you, then you can also click on Print button to save the report. Unfortunately, option to save results as text file is not available. Still it is a handy software to easily check hard disk drive status.
Its interface is user-friendly and provides two main options: S.M.A.R.T test and Sector test. So you can select any option and double-click on the hard drive icon to start the test. This software is around 2 MB in size.
Also check full review.
CheckDrive
CheckDrive (free version) is an easy to use software and checks hard disk drive to find bad sectors, fragmentation level, etc. You can select any partition of your hard disk to start the test. Once the test is completed, it will show whether that particular partition works correctly or not. It can also help to fix errors, if possible.
Apart from checking the status of different hard drive partitions, it can show information of a particular partition with a pie chart. A free registration is required to unlock this software and use for free. Setup file is around 14 MB.
Full review is here.
Conclusion:
It might be possible that your hard disk drive is not functioning properly and you want to find out the reason. To get the solution whether your HDD is OK or not, you can use any software from this list. From this list, I personally like HDD Guardian. I’m more interested in knowing which one you guys like the best.
