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**Timster** · (This post was last modified: 03-03-2015, 04:05 PM by Timster.)

When you have any kind of Windows errors or corruption it is important to know that your hardware is not the culprit before you spend endless amounts of time trying to resolve the issue. Your hard drive is the most likely component to fail in a computer. This does not hold true with SSD's however they do have a life cycle. When hard drives start to fail you may not even realize it. Common issues your computer may when your hard drive starts to fail are:

Strange noises coming from your computer (clicking, screeching, grinding)
Corrupted data (Windows errors, program errors, files or folders not able to be read)
Sluggishness (computer not responding, very slow boot/shutdown times)
Blue screens (System crashes to BSOD for no reason)
Freezing (system locks up or does not respond)
Disappearing data (pictures, documents, videos etc)

It is important to be sure your hard drive is healthy especially before you start troubleshooting software and Windows issues with your computer. There are a number of tools to test your hard drive and SSD's. This tutorial covers SeaTools by Seagate. Note that just because this tool is created by Seagate it is effective at diagnosing other drives by different manufacturers.

It is important to note that you should never trust just one tool for testing your hard drives.

How to test your Hard Drive or SSD with SeaTools

Got to the download page for SeaTools for Windows

Click "I Accept" at the bottom of the "Release Notes"

[Image: I-accept.png]

Click "Download" under the "Instruction" header

[Image: download-seatools.png]

After the download is done run the installer and click "next" when prompted to install

[Image: run-seatools.png]

Agree to the license agreement and click "Next"

[Image: agree-to-terms.png]

Choose your destination for the install and click "Next"

[Image: browse-to-install-seatools.png]

Now click "Install" on the next window

[Image: install-seatools.png]

Click "Finish" when the installation is complete

[Image: finish.png]

Go to where SeaTools was installed and run the application

[Image: seatools-for-windows.png]

Accept the "End User License Agreement"

[Image: I-accept-2.png]

Select the drive you want to test

[Image: select-drive.png]

Select "Basic Test" and choose "S.M.A.R.T.Check" to have SeaTools read the SMART data on the drive

[Image: basic-tests-S.M.A.R.T.png]

Once the test is complete SeaTools will display the results

[Image: smart-passed.png]

Next under "Basic Test" select "Short Drive Self Test" to run the short test on the drive. This option takes the least amount of time and takes the testing a step further than the SMART data read test.

[Image: basic-short-drive-self-test.png]

[Image: basic-short-drive-self-test.png]

Once the test is complete SeaTools will display the results

[Image: passed-short-test.png]

SeaTools offers more advanced drive testing that takes considerably more time but you will be sure that your drive is healthy.