Bad sectors on hard drive format

[ojas25]

If I format my hard drive will it remove the bad sectors on the drive. Ojas

[Allan]

If you do a full format (as opposed to a quick format) it will first run chkdsk /r and mark any bad sectors (they cannot be "fixed", only marked so the system knows they should not be used). This is a transparent operation and you will not know checkdisk is running, but the format will take longer.

[quaxo]

As Allan already said, they won't be removed. They can't be repaired.

But to add, if you are getting a large number of these (more than a few) it might be a good idea to replace the drive.

[Geek-9pm]

As Allan already said, they won't be removed. They can't be repaired.

But to add, if you are getting a large number of these (more than a few) it might be a good idea to replace the drive.

Ditto

[Salmon Trout]

But to add, if you are getting a large number of these (more than a few) it might be a good idea to replace the drive.

This is what I think too. When a hard disk is manufactured there will be a few defects; no disk is perfect. To pass quality control, enough good sectors to provide the advertised capacity must be there, and also a number of reserve sectors. As the disk is being used, the firmware monitors the disk state and if a bad sector develops, it is mapped out and a reserve sector mapped in its place. This happens invisibly as far as the OS and filesystem are concerned. Once all the reserves are used up, then the disk drive cannot mask them any longer and has to report them to the OS and you have to use chkdisk etc. So the disk has already used up 8 of its 9 lives. The list of remapped sectors is called the G-List, and when the G-List starts to fill up, it's time to buy a new disk. The S.M.A.R.T. diagnostic information system monitors this sort of data.