How can I check if my hard disk is failing?

Are there any free tools that I can download for this?

Since the past week I’ve had trouble resuming Windows from my laptop. A couple of times, it might have been due to the temperature of the laptop (been out in below 0 temperature for a few hours), where I would get a message saying that the OS was not found. After letting my laptop warm up for a while, it would start normally again. Today when I tried to start it, it wouldn’t resume windows, so I had to turn it off and turn it on again and then it worked fine. When I sent the error report to MS, then it opened the windows error reporting web page, which said that it’s a hard disk error. Any idea what else could be causing it?

Thanks.

Re: How can I check if my hard disk is failing?

Loose connection of hard drive can cause this too.

How can I find out what's causing it?

Re: How can I check if my hard disk is failing?

Check for some freeware on download.com

diagnose hard drive software downloads and reviews - CNET Downloads

Re: How can I check if my hard disk is failing?

If it's a S.M.A.R.T drive then there are some applications which help you keep an eye on HD health.
As for not been able to boot some time, it could be for many reasons. From loose connection to corrupt memory locations in the RAM. Also try avoiding turning your laptop on below zero degree C, since although the harddisk surface itself is in closed environment, but the connections are not. And condensation may demage those fine connections.

I just tried pcdiag ultra lite. The read/write functions were fine.

Can you suggest a good tool to see if the connections are ok?

Re: How can I check if my hard disk is failing?

Send it over to me and I'll fix it for ya for free ;)

If I know it needs fixing, I still have the extended warranty :)

Re: How can I check if my hard disk is failing?

Hard drives are so cheap, throw it out the window and get the new one. I saw 500gb for $57 at micro center.

Re: How can I check if my hard disk is failing?

nice links