HDD Issues - Need Help!

Okay, I’m starting to seriously panic here. So, my laptop was just in sleep mode, and when I woke it up—bam—this pop-up appears telling me my hard drive is in bad shape and might fail any second. I just clicked "remind me later." 🙂 I went to grab a CrystalDiskInfo screenshot just now, but that error message popped up again. Here is the CrystalDiskInfo screenshot KLIK and the screenshot of the error message KLIK. The only thing highlighted in red is the spin-up time; everything else looks fine, along with whatever is cut off at the bottom. I did a little Googling and read that spin-up time is often a false alarm. It says the value is 1, which makes absolutely no sense to me.
The laptop itself seems to be running fine; maybe the boot time is a little slow, but otherwise, it's perfect—fast, no freezing, and zero Blue Screens of Death. I know this might be the wrong subforum, but since it's an HDD and those go into desktops too, I figured I'd post here anyway 😍 HELP 🙂

First things first, make sure you back up everything onto a separate drive. 😁

Angela Flores4 said:First things first, make sure you back up everything onto a separate drive. 😁

How long does it take to back up about 500GB of data?

Hey, check if your hard drive happens to have a firmware update available click
Is your boot time slower than usual? That spin time error usually suggests the drive is struggling to reach its required RPM

Have you tried running some other tools, like HD Tune, just to double-check the health status and run an error scan?

Adam Moore3 said:How long does it take to back up about 500GB of data?

If you’re just using the old-school copy-paste method, then it takes up exactly as much room as the files themselves, doesn't it? Honestly, if you suspect your drive is on its last legs, now really isn't the time for philosophical debates over storage math; shouldn't you be frantically moving those files to safety before everything goes south? Get the data off first, and then worry about the troubleshooting later—I certainly learned that lesson the hard way.

Kimberly Gomez34 said:Hey, check if your hard drive happens to have a firmware update available click
Is your boot time slower than usual? That spin time error usually suggests the drive is struggling to reach its required RPM

Have you tried running some other tools, like HD Tune, just to double-check the health status and run an error scan?

Alright, I'll try to track down some new firmware. Should I look for it on the HP site or go straight to the manufacturer's page?

Regarding boot speeds, it hasn't actually gotten any faster. I think the issue is just the sheer amount of junk that needs to load at startup before anything can actually run. You've got Catalyst, the integration drivers, that Rapid Storage crap, 3D Drive Guard, some DTS audio driver, and then the antivirus. It technically boots quickly, but it takes forever to actually "wake up" and reach full speed while all those services initialize. Honestly, it’s not that surprising given how much software is fighting for priority, especially since two-thirds of the drive is already full... it's just a lot to handle.

Ran the HD Tune test, here are the results... HELP So, it’s showing up exactly like it does in CrystalDiskInfo, except now I’ve got a warning on this one too... 🤷 Honestly, the laptop itself is fast and works great—I can't really complain. It isn't even that old, so I find it hard to believe the hard drive would fail this quickly... 🕺

Angela Flores4 said:If you’re just using the old-school copy-paste method, then it takes up exactly as much room as the files themselves, doesn't it? Honestly, if you suspect your drive is on its last legs, now really isn't the time for philosophical debates over storage math; shouldn't you be frantically moving those files to safety before everything goes south? Get the data off first, and then worry about the troubleshooting later—I certainly learned that lesson the hard way.

Is there seriously no easier way to handle backups? I am not manually copying 500 GB... where am I even supposed to put all that?! 😲 I mean, I’ve already saved the most critical stuff—that part's done. Between games, downloads, and about 50 movies, that's roughly 350 GB right there, leaving just the system files and essentials. What I really want to know is if I can make a full system backup through Windows so I can just hit restore later if things go south. I am definitely not copy-pasting 500 GB manually; I'm not a maniac, and I don't even have the space to store all that extra junk.

UPDATE

Since most people I looked up online say this spin-up time issue usually happens when waking from sleep mode, I decided to try a full restart. I haven't actually shut down my PC in ages—I just let it sleep. Well, after a reboot, CrystalDiskInfo shows everything in blue and says the status is good. However, when I KLIK in HD Tune, it makes zero sense. Now the spin-up time is showing as 93, which matches what CrystalDiskInfo says, but HD Tune keeps throwing an error for it. I don't get why. 🤷 Honestly, it feels like a false alarm, but I'd still love some confirmation just to be sure.

That second error also points toward a hardware issue. Here’s the deal: The Calibration retry count is the number of times it's had to recalibrate itself to aligning the heads with the tracks so it can read data appropriately.

Honestly, there's no way to know if it's just a false positive or if things are actually going south. That said, both programs flagged the same thing (the spin up time). If everything seems to be running smoothly, you might be fine, but it would be smart to back up anything essential—like your tax docs, sensitive files, etc.—to another drive. Don't bother backing up hundreds of gigabytes of games or movies; forget it, you can always redownload them if you have to. How much warranty coverage do you have left? If you've got plenty of time, you could just keep an eye on it for a while, but if the warranty is about to expire, it might be worth filing a claim 🤷

Before you do that, though, maybe try an official diagnostic tool from Seagate (I believe it's called Seatools). You can find some links here

BTW, we have the exact same wallpaper (footpaths)—that image is so fitting right now lol

Kimberly Gomez34 said:That second error also points toward a hardware issue. Here’s the deal: The Calibration retry count is the number of times it's had to recalibrate itself to aligning the heads with the tracks so it can read data appropriately.

Honestly, there's no way to know if it's just a false positive or if things are actually going south. That said, both programs flagged the same thing (the spin up time). If everything seems to be running smoothly, you might be fine, but it would be smart to back up anything essential—like your tax docs, sensitive files, etc.—to another drive. Don't bother backing up hundreds of gigabytes of games or movies; forget it, you can always redownload them if you have to. How much warranty coverage do you have left? If you've got plenty of time, you could just keep an eye on it for a while, but if the warranty is about to expire, it might be worth filing a claim 🤷

Before you do that, though, maybe try an official diagnostic tool from Seagate (I believe it's called Seatools). You can find some links here

BTW, we have the exact same wallpaper (footpaths)—that image is so fitting right now lol

CrystalDisk shows the exact same thing for me—Calibration retry count is blue, meaning everything is okay. I don't get why HD Tune shows red for spin up time after a restart, because the numbers are within the normal range now, yet it keeps throwing that red warning. 🤷 Yeah, definitely, I'll move all my important files over to my desktop too. I still have warranty until October, so about a month and a half left. I'm not sure if they'll even honor the claim; I really don't want to ship my laptop away for two weeks to a service center just to have it sent back in the same condition. All my college work is on there, everything is organized... if I move to a different computer, I'll have to redo all the annoying setup for programming, compilers, and all that, which sounds like a massive headache. 🥱 I'll think about it. I've run into this topic before, so I'll check those links and maybe try Seatools. One thing that confuses me, though: when I Google ST750LM022, I see both Samsung ST750LM022 and Seagate ST750LM022 results. I have no idea who actually manufactures these things. 🤷

Best wallpaper ever. I need something calming right now since I have to study for my third attempt at finals😬

It’s pretty obvious that Seagate/Western Digital manufactured this hard drive 🤷

Back in December 2011, Seagate picked up Western Digital's HDD business.

If you want to see how they handle their branding, check out this ad link (though honestly, that's more for the corporate types than someone just walking into a Best Buy)

My best guess? Samsung likely built the drive, and since Seagate bought out Western Digital's HDD division while that specific model was still in its prime, they just kept using both names to move stock. It's a classic move—kind of like when Intel bought through acquisitions and brands overlapped for a while until consumers finally got used to the new logo on the websites and store shelves.

Grab Hiren’s Boot CD, run the more intensive test, and if it flags the drive for replacement, just snap a photo, print it out, and take it straight to the warranty claim.

As for the lag and slow boot times, that’s just what happens with those crappy 5400k drives. Even at my job, we're running i7s and Core i5 4200 m processors, and everything still boots painfully slow—those disks are just garbage, I guess.

fadedorca66 said:Grab Hiren’s Boot CD, run the more intensive test, and if it flags the drive for replacement, just snap a photo, print it out, and take it straight to the warranty claim.

As for the lag and slow boot times, that’s just what happens with those crappy 5400k drives. Even at my job, we're running i7s and Core i5 4200 m processors, and everything still boots painfully slow—those disks are just garbage, I guess.

Can I just throw this on a USB drive and boot from there? I haven't actually used it anywhere yet. Honestly, it really baffled me at first—I'm running a Core i5 4200 m, which is more than a solid processor by any standard. I even bumped the RAM up by another 4 gigs, so I'm sitting at 8 GB now. I keep the thing well-maintained, cleaning it out and making sure nothing unnecessary is hitting the startup, but still... It’s just that there's a massive amount of data sitting on here, which definitely isn't helping, especially considering this thing is just a 5400 RPM piece of junk. 😁

It’s probably not the lack of files slowing him down, unless everything is super fragmented. You could just throw Hiren's onto a USB; honestly, this program makes it easiest:

https://rufus.akeo.ie/

I wonder what could be causing my new computer to show a hard drive capacity of only 194 GB when it’s actually supposed to be a 1 TB drive? I'm using a Seagate Barracuda 1TB HDD, and the OS is Windows 10 ME edition 64-bit—if that even makes sense! I guess I've just never run into something like this before.

Lawrence Reed3 said:I wonder what could be causing my new computer to show a hard drive capacity of only 194 GB when it’s actually supposed to be a 1 TB drive? I'm using a Seagate Barracuda 1TB HDD, and the OS is Windows 10 ME edition 64-bit—if that even makes sense! I guess I've just never run into something like this before.

Maybe you just have it split into multiple partitions?

Lawrence Reed3 said:I wonder what could be causing my new computer to show a hard drive capacity of only 194 GB when it’s actually supposed to be a 1 TB drive? I'm using a Seagate Barracuda 1TB HDD, and the OS is Windows 10 ME edition 64-bit—if that even makes sense! I guess I've just never run into something like this before.

Since this is a brand-new build, you likely partitioned the drive, setting aside 200GB for your C: drive (the OS), while the rest of the space remains unallocated or needs formatting.

If that's the case, just pull up Disk Management and format the second partition that isn't showing up in File Explorer. (I can't recall the exact menu path in Windows 10, but just type "disk management" into your search bar)