HD Tach results information.

Question

Testing many SATA lap drives, major mfgrs, several capacities, I've got one or more sharp dips in the speed graph (down to almost zero). All disks pass the Windows 7 tests and Acronis Disk Manager SMART tests. All seems to work ok. The dip location is erratic, so I don't think it is showing a bad place on the platter. The sequential read progress bar pauses at about the same place as the dip appears. What causes this? Is the disk bad? Is it ok to use?

Answer 1

It's ok to see sharp dips in the graph because the test is heavily influenced by the activities on your computer and it's normal. A HDD will rarely be in a total idle state. And because of that, you see those dips indicating another activity on the hard drive. Take a look at my graph and you'll see what I mean. The drives are OK. If the smart data is green, then the HDD should be fine.