Comments for How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

Comment from mmm on 2010-12-22

2010-12-22T20:29:43Z

I found the approach of the person asking the question was genious! If I had the patience I would try that myself. My mom gave me a 32gb flash drive that I never been able to use. And I cant return it cause she bought while on a trip :(

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Wolf99 on 2010-05-06

2010-05-06T12:58:21Z

I have 128MB LG and 8GB SDOstorage USB flash drives. 128Mb flash drive works perfectly after 4 years usage. 8GB USB flash drive worked perfectly only few months. It seems to me that reliability is depend on storage capacity: the more storage the less reliability? Can a cell phone radiation corrupt files on USB flash drive if both devices are in one pocket.

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Reed on 2010-04-07

2010-04-07T23:10:50Z

I have a 8GB 2.5" form factor IDE flash disk formatted as FAT32 that has a 2 GB file that is critical to my work. I cannot read past about the 308MB mark with any utility I've tried. I need to recover as much data as possible from the rest of the file, but I haven't found a way to get at any of the rest of the data. In Windows the file transfer freezes when it gets to the 308MB mark and the disk must be forcefully removed before I can access it again at all (I have it mounted using a USB to IDE adapter).I have also tried it in a VxWorks RTOS system and tried transferring the file via FTP. Same result - fails at 308MB. I don't need the drive, just whatever is left of the data. I tried CHKDSK /r and it froze and never finished. CHKDSK /f said some bad File Allocation Tables detected. I tried creating an image using Acronis True Image 11 and it freezes at the same point, even with "ignore bad sectors" option set. Any other tools that you think might help?

If it's a flash drive, then no, I don't have any ideas. I believe you may be out of luck.

08-Apr-2010

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from cheapybob on 2010-03-30

2010-03-30T18:45:20Z

Leo, I don't pretend to be an expert on the subject, but I read that the newer flash drives no longer "wear out". I suspect many of the people having these problems actually have "fake" sized flash drives, where you bought a 16 gb drive, but its really a 2 gb drive where its been modified to APPEAR as though its a 16 gb drive. Of course when you try to write 16 gb to it and read it back, only the first couple gb are correct, and the rest appears corrupted. A freeware program called h2wtest 1.4 can be downloaded to test for fake flash drives.

Now me, being the chap bugger that I am, and having gotten a refund for the 16 gb flashdrive I PAID for, *I* would like to MARK the other 14 gb and USE the 2 gb worth of chip that really is there. I would have been able to do this in the old days by creating files of the block size and then using a utility to identify the bad files, but I can't find any modern day utility to test and mark the bad areas. Any suggestions?

The technology behind flash memory still wears out - it's just getting better and thus lasts longer. But eventually it dies. I've never heard of or experienced the "fake" scenario you describe. Might run chkdsk /F /R on it, but if it's bad, it's risky to use at all and I'd discard it.

31-Mar-2010

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Comment from HiRo on 2009-12-26

2009-12-27T01:26:02Z

High end type probably have wear levelling, but then again they are probably quite reliable being high end. For these, it's likely the drive will become obsolete due to it's size long before the drive physically fails. We're talking here about low end stuff, not so great quality but cheap, and I'm sure that for the guys who produce it wear levelling is the last thing on their mind, but rather how to make it cheaper and reliable enough and get it out on the market ASAP so they can make some bucks before they need to produce a bigger size. So I think the issue is valid, for low end type of sticks that most likely don't have wear levelling, I'm sure you can mark the bad sectors and use quite safely what's left. And besides, without theorizing whether it has or not wear levelling, you can just go ahead and mark whatever bad sects you see, and if they keep popping up afterwards it means the stick does have wear levelling and this approach won't work. On the other hand, if I'm right, it will just work, and you'll get a reasonably reliable stick.

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Amzy on 2009-10-21

2009-10-21T18:30:01Z

If like me you don't want to let go of your flash drive and you know theres bad sectors on there somewhere maybe sourcing where these are specifically and partitioning the drive so the partition with the bad sectors you don't use, would that work im no techy expert so im asking you guys?

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Younas Khan on 2009-05-22

2009-05-23T05:37:13Z

i hav got the bad sectors prob in ma flash drive.....does any one knows about the free utility to recover it....

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Vishal on 2008-12-04

2008-12-04T11:47:33Z

I am facing the quite similar problem with my FlashDrive.
In my case, whenever I copy any data it gets copied properly. But after sometime, the files get corrupted. Names of the files in the folder gets changed to something random.

I don't think its a virus as I have checked that.
Is it because of bad sectors? Is my problem exactly the same?

Did you read the article you just commented on? Time to replace it, it's wearing out.

- Leo
04-Dec-2008

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Markk on 2008-11-23

2008-11-24T03:24:15Z

My memory stick has falled; bad sector. Is there any way I can retrive the data I have on it before I through it out?

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Nahom on 2008-07-23

2008-07-23T10:06:17Z

i think i have a kind of same problem. i can see the flash in the my computer window. i can also see the files in it. but i cant open any of them, copy from or copy to the flash. And also i cant format it. Doing all these i see the CRC check error message. Any ideas?

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Ronald P. Nosack on 2008-05-17

2008-05-17T21:45:41Z

HP has a fee utility just for formatting flash drives. Worth a shot.

Packrat1947

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

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Comment from Glenn P. on 2008-05-13

2008-05-13T08:36:44Z

DON'T give up on your Flash Drive if it has corrupted files!

One thing I've found, that may be a factor in disk errors on a Flash Drive, is the type of filesystem being used. Try a more primitive one!

Some Flash Drives are intolerant of NTFS, so try FAT32 instead. Some may also be intolerant of FAT32, so if even FAT32 doesn't work, try FAT16 (a.k.a. simply "FAT") instead. I found that one Flash Drive which regularly corrupted files, abruptly settled down and started behaving perfectly, after I reformatted and went from FAT32 to ordinary FAT. In either/any case, GOOD LUCK! :)

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A comment on: How do I fix bad sectors on a flash drive?

Tech Questions? Get Answers! - Ask Leo! ... by Leo Notenboom
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