How to remove DELAYED sectors on HDD

[CYRIX]

Hello, recently a friend was gifted to me 5 different old hard drives, and I decided to scan them with the HD REGENERATOR program, but one of them SEA GATE 40 GB turned out to have 3 DELAYED sectors. I tried to fix them by use setting the REGENATE ALL SECTORS option, but still these DELAYED sectors are still there. I tried with other programs like VICTORIA but this program brought out even more errors and defects. Then I also tried with HDAT2, but there the results were that the hard drive is clean without any errors.

After a lot of reading on the internet, for weeks, I came across your forum. I've been trying different options with MHDD for almost a month now, carefully reading the entire manual, and then trying everything step by step with the ERASE, then ERASE DELAYES, then REMAPPING options. I ran another scan with HD REGENERATOR, but again those DELAYED sectors are still there! How can I remove these DELAYED sectors? Please someone with more experience help. Thanks in advance!

P.S.
I specify that, I tested these programs under pure DOS, no Windows! I even start MHDD with BIOS off so it can work directly with the hard disk controller!

 

[mackerel]

I assume you're talking about PENDING sectors. The general requirement to remove them is to write over them, but since you don't know where they are, usually that means a full surface write. Try a full surface read, which will detect any current pending sectors that may be unknown. Then do a full surface write, which should get rid of all the pending sectors. Then do another full surface read, which should confirm they're gone. If you still have some, then either the drive isn't repairing them, or it found some new ones after the last write/read cycle.

I use hddscan which runs under Windows.

Also, 40GB is pretty ancient. Is it even worth it?

 

[CYRIX]

I assume you're talking about PENDING sectors. The general requirement to remove them is to write over them, but since you don't know where they are, usually that means a full surface write. Try a full surface read, which will detect any current pending sectors that may be unknown. Then do a full surface write, which should get rid of all the pending sectors. Then do another full surface read, which should confirm they're gone. If you still have some, then either the drive isn't repairing them, or it found some new ones after the last write/read cycle.

I use hddscan which runs under Windows.

Also, 40GB is pretty ancient. Is it even worth it?

Of course, why not
I'm basically a connoisseur of old hardware, and also collector, and I often use such old hard drives mostly for operation system LINUX installation, especially when I'm making a router with a firewall or a home server. But I would never keep important information there.

Anyway thanks for the advice anyway, I'll try to do a surface read with MHDD, I mostly use this program because it works under pure DOS, it can detect a hard drive even if you turn it off from BIOS, since MHDD works directly with the hard disk controller, and this is the most efficient!