# WD drive C5 yellow - Problem ?



## DelBoy (May 18, 2016)

Hello, first of all sorry for my bad English. I had some weird hard freezes in games with distorted sound last two weeks, so i googled and many people that had similar problems said that it may be HDD problem. So i ran CrystalDiskInfo and there was one yellow problem "C5 Current Pending Sector Count 174 - 174". But HDTune doesn't show any problems and says that C5 is "ok".

That's old HDD and i use it as my disk for games, i use Intel SSD for system, also i've tried to play stalker on a SSD and i also got Hard Lock with distorted sound.

I ran chkdsk /f C: (for my SSD), and chkdsk /f G:, and F:, for my HDD. And it didn't helped. So is this a serious problem ? Is my disk dying ? 
Thanks.


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## jsfitz54 (May 18, 2016)

I would back up that drive, asap.  Sometimes if you move your programs off the disk, then reformat the disk problems go away.  That WD...AAKS is 10-15 years old?  Relocated sector count is growing and sometimes there is a cascading effect that grows rapidly.  So move your files and try a *long format.* The extra stress of a long full format may show further weaknesses.
In any event it will always show yellow, at best, going forward.

You can use this WD tool to test the drive:   http://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?DL

Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows
File Size: 975 KB
Version: v1.29
Release Date: 10/2015 | Release Notes

Download

*Description*
This is a Windows version of the Data LifeGuard Diagnostics. It will test WD internal and external drives. In additional, it can provide you with the model and serial of WD drives attached to the system.
*Supported Operating Systems*

Windows 10
Windows 8 32/64-bit versions
Windows 7 32/64-bit versions
Windows Vista 32/64 bit versions
Windows XP 32/64-bit versions
*Instructions*

Download the Windows Data Lifeguard Diagnostics, .zip
Extract and run the program, WinDlg.exe. If running Windows Vista (or later), you will need to *Right-Click on the WinDlg.exe file* and choose to *Run As Administrator*.
Read and accept the license agreement to continue.
On the main program screen, there are two windows. In the top window, you will see the drives in your system that are available for testing. The model number, serial number, capacity, and SMART status of each drive will be displayed. In the bottom window, the partition information for the selected drive will be displayed.
Highlight the drive and select the icon on the top row to test or run SMART status.
When you select the run tests icon, the "DLGDIAG - Select an Option" window appears.
You will see the following options:
QUICK TEST - performs SMART drive quick self-test to gather and verify the Data Lifeguard information contained on the drive.
EXTENDED TEST - performs a Full Media Scan to detect bad sectors. Test may take several hours to complete depending on the size of the drive.
WRITE ZEROS - writes zeros to the drive with options of Full Erase and Quick Erase. File system and data will be lost.
VIEW TEST RESULT - displays the latest test results.

Select the test you wish to perform and click the Start button.
When the test completes, you will be notified with a pass/fail message. Click the Close button.

*Applicable Products*
My Passport AV-TV, WD Elements Desktop, WD Caviar RAID Edition, WD Caviar Blue, WD Blue SSHD, WD Blue / SE / SE16 (SATA II / III), WD Blue, WD Green, WD Green / GP, WD Black SSHD, WD Black, WD Black2 Dual Drive, WD Red (Mobile), WD Red, WD Red Pro, WD Re+, WD RE / WD RE4, WD Se, WD Ae, WD Purple, WD AV-GP, WD VelociRaptor, WD AV, WD Protégé, WD Laptop Mainstream , WD Xe, WD Desktop Mainstream , WD Desktop Performance, WD S25


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## DelBoy (May 18, 2016)

Thank you, unfortunately i don't have any spare disk to make a backup. This disk is bought in 2010. and it say it's made in 2010., if the number of C5 isn't rising am i ok, or ? However i was thinking about buying another disk.


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## jsfitz54 (May 18, 2016)

You are ok if things remain the same.  It could last or fail suddenly.  If those sectors quite while you were playing you could have corrupt data.  Best practice would be to get a replacement drive.  What did the WD utility report?


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## DelBoy (May 18, 2016)

jsfitz54 said:


> You are ok if things remain the same.  I could last or fail suddenly.  If those sectors quite while you were playing you could have corrupt data.  Best practice would be to get a replacement drive.  What did the WD utility report?



I just woke up and checked CrystalDisk, and numbers are same, also i launched WD life guard quick test and it passed. But test was running for like 2mins. maybe.


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## P4-630 (May 18, 2016)

I wouldn't take any risk, backup your data and buy a new disk before it fails.


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## Jetster (May 18, 2016)

If WD Data LifeGuard Diagnostics says its a pass then your good. Sometime Crystal Disk gives warnings that aren't actually a warning to worry about.
But at 6 years and only 23,000 hours you should be good for awhile

If you have any further question, SuperSoph_WD is a rep


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## DelBoy (May 18, 2016)

Jetster said:


> If WD Data LifeGuard Diagnostics says its a pass then your good. Sometime Crystal Disk gives warnings that aren't actually a warning to worry about.
> But at 6 years and only 23,000 hours you should be good for awhile
> 
> If you have any further question, SuperSoph_WD is a rep



Yeah it's a bit old, but i'm turning off my PC every night, also HDD is quiet and cold. That's just a WD Data LifeGuard quick test, i'll try extended one, also HDTune tune says that Status for C5 and Health are Ok, but it still gives Current: 174 and Worst 174, and i don't have a clue what that could be.


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## P4-630 (May 18, 2016)

Ok waiting for @SuperSoph_WD ...


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## jsfitz54 (May 18, 2016)

DelBoy said:


> That's just a WD Data LifeGuard quick test, i'll try extended one



The extended test is what you want.  Hard drives are able to compensate for mechanical/physical flaws up to a point.  That's what the firmware does.  You might be good for a long time or things can go bad fast.  If the extended test comes back OK, then I would keep using the drive but I would also purchase an external hard drive and back up your files.

You may have corrupt data, so if you continue to have hard freezes in game, you might want to repair/reinstall game.


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## Frick (May 18, 2016)

DelBoy said:


> Yeah it's a bit old, but i'm turning off my PC every night, also HDD is quiet and cold. That's just a WD Data LifeGuard quick test, i'll try extended one, also HDTune tune says that Status for C5 and Health are Ok, but it still gives Current: 174 and Worst 174, and i don't have a clue what that could be.View attachment 74710



The current/worst are scales, not numbers, and they're arbitrary. Confusing. The data column is the actual number, unless it's bugged so the number has nothing to do with reality. Crystaldisk reports the numbers in hexadecimal, HDtune in decimal, which is why rhe numbers are different.

And that's pending sector count, meaning there's probably somthing wrong with the sector(s) but they haven't been reallocated yet.


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## jsfitz54 (May 18, 2016)

Frick said:


> meaning there's probably somthing wrong with the sector(s) but they haven't been reallocated yet.



^ +1 : That's why I wanted a full/long format, so the firmware could compensate for any bad areas on the disk.
Plus, it acts as an added stressor (heat) so that if it's going to fail, you know sooner than later.


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## DelBoy (May 18, 2016)

Ok, Extended test finished after around 1h and 15m and it says "Pass", i really don't know what to think about it now, 2 programs says it's fine, crystaldisk says "caution"


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## R-T-B (May 18, 2016)

Vendor software I find won't tell you to return something unless it's almost dead.

Fact is, you have 2194 unstable sectors.  Whether or not that's concerning is mostly a matter of whether that value was in one freak incident, or whether it is actively rising.


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## jsfitz54 (May 18, 2016)

The Crystal Ball says...


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## SuperSoph_WD (May 20, 2016)

Welcome to the TPU community, @DelBoy 

First of all, apologies for my late reply! Thank you, @Jetster & @P4-630 for letting me know about his issue. 
Second of all, I'd suggest you find a backup drive or ask a friend to lend you one, so that you copy your data and make sure it's safe and sound somewhere off-site. 

I saw conflicting test results and seems like you got a large number of pending sectors. This parameter indicates the unstable sectors that could potentially go bad _(get remapped) !_ I'd advise you to click on the small icon above the list of storage drives in the Data LifeGuard Utility and view the S.M.A.R.T. data from there as well. 
However, it's still a pretty concerning number of unstable sectors, so you should definitely get in touch with our *Customer Support, *either by phone or e-mail, *if things get worse! *
Meanwhile, find a backup solution using a friend's help or an online storage cloud solution. Once your files are copied, you could also try running the WRITE ZEROS feature from the DLG tool. The *FULL ERASE* will completely reformat the drive and wipe all the sectors. Afterwards, attempt to run both the QUICK and EXTENDED tests again, as well as the third-party diagnostic tools and see what the results will be then. 

Keep us posted with the troubleshooting! Good luck!  
SuperSoph_WD


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## timta2 (May 20, 2016)

Why would someone contact Customer Support in regards to a drive that's obviously way out of warranty? He said he bought it in 2010 and it originally had a 2 or 3 year warranty. Does WD make exceptions in certain cases? Just out of curiosity anyway. It seems to me that they would probably tell him to replace the drive, I know that's what I would do. Disks with surface issues typically only get worse, at least in my experience. 

http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/SpecSheet/ENG/2879-701277.pdf


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## SuperSoph_WD (May 20, 2016)

timta2 said:


> Why would someone contact Customer Support in regards to a drive that's obviously way out of warranty? He said he bought it in 2010 and it originally had a 2 or 3 year warranty. Does WD make exceptions in certain cases? Just out of curiosity anyway. It seems to me that they would probably tell him to replace the drive, I know that's what I would do. Disks with surface issues typically only get worse, at least in my experience.
> 
> http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/SpecSheet/ENG/2879-701277.pdf



Unfortunately, RMA-ing when the drive is out of warranty is not possible.  However, they might be able to provide him with further troubleshooting steps or other backup ideas. You are right, replacing the drive would definitely keep @DelBoy 's peace of mind. If that is not an option for him at the moment, I'd just suggest to keep an eye on the HDD's S.M.A.R.T attributes. If those unstable sectors get remapped as bad (Reallocated Sector Count), I definitely wouldn't trust my files with it. Backing up any essential data from the WD drive should be his first priority right now. 

SuperSoph_WD


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## DelBoy (May 20, 2016)

SuperSoph_WD said:


> Unfortunately, RMA-ing when the drive is out of warranty is not possible.  However, they might be able to provide him with further troubleshooting steps or other backup ideas. You are right, replacing the drive would definitely keep @DelBoy 's peace of mind. If that is not an option for him at the moment, I'd just suggest to keep an eye on the HDD's S.M.A.R.T attributes. If those unstable sectors get remapped as bad (Reallocated Sector Count), I definitely wouldn't trust my files with it. Backing up any essential data from the WD drive should be his first priority right now.
> 
> SuperSoph_WD



Thank you all, here's the list of S.M.A.R.T in LifeGuard, everything has green tick but some of them have "Warranty 1" i don't know what that is. However, yesterday i ordered new WD Blue 1TB 64mb cache WD10EZEX, so i think that will be fine for quite a while. I'll copy everything from old one to new one and then i'll completely format the drive, that should help i guess


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## Melvis (May 20, 2016)

Wait, didnt you say you get the same problem with your SSD as well? this to me suggests that its not a Hard Drive issue but something else like a software clash or Driver problem maybe?


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## R-T-B (May 20, 2016)

Melvis said:


> Wait, didnt you say you get the same problem with your SSD as well? this to me suggests that its not a Hard Drive issue but something else like a software clash or Driver problem maybe?



All he said was that he ran CHKDSK on C:.  Nowehere does the software indicate anything wrong with the SSD (his C: drive).


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## Melvis (May 20, 2016)

R-T-B said:


> All he said was that he ran CHKDSK on C:.  Nowehere does the software indicate anything wrong with the SSD (his C: drive).



He said > That's old HDD and i use it as my disk for games, i use Intel SSD for system, *also i've tried to play stalker on a SSD and i also got Hard Lock with distorted sound.*

I didnt say there was anything wrong with the SSD, just that he got the same issue/problem running a game from the SSD


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## R-T-B (May 20, 2016)

Melvis said:


> He said > That's old HDD and i use it as my disk for games, i use Intel SSD for system, *also i've tried to play stalker on a SSD and i also got Hard Lock with distorted sound.*
> 
> I didnt say there was anything wrong with the SSD, just that he got the same issue/problem running a game from the SSD



Oh, I thought you were referring to the SMART data.  Apologies.


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## DelBoy (May 20, 2016)

Yeah my SSD is fine, but it seems that freezes aren't the HDD issue, however i installed new 1TB WD hdd copied everything from old "broken" one to new, formated 500gb disk completely but C5 is still yellow with same values.


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