seagate seatools | DataRecoveryUnion.com

This post describes how to run SeaTools for Windows and provides some comprehensive advice about using the test to assist in troubleshooting.

First: Download and install SeaTools.

Launch SeaTools by following these steps once it is installed:

Click on Start.
Select Programs.
Select Seagate.
Select SeaTools for Windows.

A. Prepare the System

Isolate SeaTools – close all other applications before running a hard disc diagnostic. The main reason for this is to keep the drive focused on SeaTools as much as possible. Otherwise, Windows will continue to give the disc drive commands to access data for the needs of the other applications. When that happens, SeaTools will temporarily suspend its current progress while the drive is busy. This is harmless to the drive and a routine condition of use; however, it causes the SeaTools tests to take much longer time to complete.
SeaTools’ Drive Identification – External drives that connect to the system through USB, 1394 Firewire or eSATA do not have the same background activity as the Internal drive. Internal drives are identified as PATA (Parallel ATA or IDE), SATA (Serial ATA), SCSI or SAS (Serial-Attached SCSI). Most desktop and notebook systems have one SATA or PATA internal drive.
Keep the computer fully powered on – Power management controls may need to be suspended while doing very long tests. A complete drive scan may take a few hours to complete. The drive is working on its own at these times and the system may decide it should go into Stand By or Hibernate modes. Windows XP Control Panel Power Options has a setting “Turn off hard disks” and should be set to “Never” during the test.
Plug in your notebook computer – Notebook systems should not run the long tests using just battery power. These tests are disc-intensive and will draw more current than a typical usage profile. Be sure to connect the AC adapter to ensure adequate power during the tests.

B. Select the Drives to Test
After SeaTools loads, the screen will list the different storage devices in your system. Select the drive you would like to test by making a check mark in the box next to the drive information. This screen also displays information about the drives such as the Model Number and Serial Number. Seagate model numbers begin with the letters “ST“. Seagate serial numbers are alphanumeric and eight characters long.

However, Seatools for Windows often displays the serial number and even the model number of the internal drive inside the external case, and these numbers do not correspond to the numbers that Seagate assigns to the external unit as a whole.

Seagate and Maxtor drives models are given a gold drive icon. Non-Seagate drives have a silver drive icon.

You may select more than one drive at a time to test them simultaneously.

C. Select the Tests to Run

A menu of the possible diagnostic tests is shown. All Basic Tests are data safe, read-only tests. Select the tests that you would like to perform. The test will begin immediately.
These tests include:

Short Drive Self Test (20 to 90 seconds long)
Long Drive Self Test (may take up to 4 hours, progress in 10% increments)
Drive Information
Short Generic
Long Generic (progress in 1% increments)

When you launch the “Short Drive Self Test” (DST) most drives will run a thorough diagnostic routine that is built in to the hard drive’s firmware. DST is completely data safe.
The “Short Drive Self Test” is adequate for most situations. Consider running the long Generic or long DST test, which reads each sector on the drive if you need a more comprehensive test.
The long tests will take time to complete. Because the long tests read every sector on the drive, the amount of time required will depend on the speed and capacity of the disc drive. The highest capacity drives often take 2 to 4 hours to complete. During the “Long Drive Self Test” progress is reported in 10% increments only. On large drives, 10% progress may take as much as 15 minutes. The apparent lack of activity often gives the impression that the drive or software has stopped responding. Please do not abort the Long Drive Self Test unless an adequate length of time has elapsed to complete the first 10%. Unfortunately, this 10% granularity is an industry standard.

D. Aborting the Diagnostics
The SeaTools performs a data-safe test of the selected hard disc drive or device for possible malfunctions. Long tests may be aborted at any time. Select the Abort Tests icon from the menu bar.
You can abort the test at any time without harming the drive, although the drive will not be fully tested if the test is aborted.

E. Summary of Results
Upon completion of running the diagnostics, a log for each drive is saved to the RAM drive.
The following conditions may apply:

Passed
Failed
Aborted

More often than not, SeaTools for Windows will test with a PASS status. SeaTools for Windows is a useful testing tool to eliminate the hard disc drive as the source or physical cause of some system problem.

A drive can be perfectly healthy but be holding corrupted data. If this is the case, you can attempt to repair the data. If it fails, then the data needs to be re-installed or re-saved.

Bad sectors (LBAs) may be detected during the test. The test will halt with a Fail status. If you are testing an internal PATA (IDE) or SATA disc drive, in this case, we recommend that you run the Long Test in the bootable version, SeaTools for DOS, which has the ability to repair sectors in most cases. Checkdisk can repair bad sectors.

If this software indicates a FAIL test status and you are testing an external hard drive, which uses a USB or 1394 type of bus connection, you should consider checking the warranty status of your device. You can check the warranty status for Seagate products at the Seagate Warranty Services Page website. You will need to write down the serial number for the drive you intend to check.

Please remember that Seatools for Windows often displays the serial number and even the model number of the internal drive inside the external case, and these numbers do not correspond to the numbers that Seagate assigns to the external unit as a whole. See the drive label for the serial number.

Hard Disk Repair

Seatools For DOS Tutorial

DATARECOVERYUNION.COM15 years ago3 years ago015 mins

SeaTools for DOS is a comprehensive, easy-to-use diagnostic tool that helps you quickly determine what is preventing you from accessing data on your desktop or notebook computer. It includes several tests that will examine the physical media on your Seagate or Maxtor disc drive and any non-Seagate disc drive. This is the walk-through for both the old (text) and new (GUI) version.

In order to use SeaTools for DOS choose to download the floppy diskette version or the bootable CD image version.

Creating a Diskette

For the floppy diskette version you will need one 1.44MB floppy diskette. Click the .EXE file downloaded from the Seagate web site and follow the on-screen instructions.

Creating a CD using the bootable CD image .ISO file.

Just copying the files to a CD will not work; the file must be burned as an image to the CD.

Once the bootable media has been created then boot the computer with the media in the drive. If it doesn’t boot from the media the boot order may need to be adjusted in the computer BIOS.

This document will cover a Graphical and a text version of Seatools for DOS. Find the guide to the graphical version immediately below.

SeaTools for Dos will not detect external drives. Please use SeaTools for Windows to test external drives.

SeaTools for DOS, Graphical version

At bootup, you will see an End User License Agreement:

Simply click “I Accept” to continue.
This will take you to the main menu page.

Under the Basic menu:

Short test – Runs a DST test against Seagate drives. If DST is not supported by the drive, Seatools runs a read test. This test takes about 2 minutes.
Long test – Runs a full scan of the drive. This is usually used to find and repair bad sectors.
Acoustic test – Spins the drive down so you can determine if noise in a system is caused by the drive or by something else.

Advanced Features

Set Capacity to 32GB – Limits drive to 32GB for use on Pentium 3 or older systems.
Set Capacity manually – Limits drive to a specific number of Logical Block Addresses (LBAs), useful when replacing an unusual drive size in a RAID.
Set Capacity to MAX – Used to resize drive to full capacity (does not bypass the limit capacity jumper).
Erase Track Zero – Quick Zero fill to erase the data and partitions from a drive. This option requires one second to complete.
Timed Erase (10 second, 20 seconds, 1 minute, 5 minutes) – Handy for when quick zero fill just doesn’t get it all (ie, in case of boot loaders, etc).
Full Erase – Fills the entire drive with zeros. It can be used to recover bad sectors and erases all data. This is not a Secure erase .

Below is the Results and Progress screen:

Model number and Serial number for drive selected.
Drive status and supported features displayed.
POH – Power on hours displayed; and Drive temperature in Celsius.

-Click View log to open the log file once the test is complete (won’t show much more than what is on the screen).

SeaTools for DOS, Text Version

Once you have booted into SeaTools a license agreement will appear.

Read the agreement and press “Y” to accept the terms and continue to the testing or press ‘”N” to exit the program. Use the Page Up and Page Down keys to scroll.

Once you agree to the license terms the testing screen will appear.

See here the varying elements of the old version’s testing screen.

D or 0-9 – Switches drives – Select which drive to perform actions on (see device area for correlating number).
S – Short test – Runs a Drive Self-Test (DST) test against Seagate drives. (If DST is not supported, Seatools runs a read test). Takes about 2 minutes.
L – Long test – Full scan of the drive. Usually used to find and repair bad sectors.
Z – Zero Fill – Wipes out the data on the drive. Good for erasing corrupted or unusual partitions. It will erase ALL partitions and data on the drive. Quick and Long options supported.
A – Spin down drive (for Acoustic test) – Spins the drive down so you can determine if noise in a system is caused by the drive or by something else.
C – Set Capacity – Used to set drive capacity to surpass the common 32GB and 137 GB limits. Also used for drives that get clipped to a lower capacity.
V – View log file – Pulls up the log file for review.

The explanation for the multi-colored text near the bottom follows:
White text: The device (ie, Device 0) and its model and serial numbers.
Yellow text: The motherboard chipset.
Aqua text: Whether the motherboard supports 48-bit Logical Block Addressing, and the Maximum LBA for this drive along with its capacity.
Green text: SMART status. If SMART has been tripped, then there is no need to run a test. The drive should be replaced.
Green text: DST (Drive Self Test) support status – If DST is supported it will be used during testing.
Blue text: Operating temperature status – Current and Max registered temp – useful in determining if heat is a factor in drive trouble or drive failure. See Product manual for specified Operating temperature. The Worst Temp refers to the highest temp that the drive has ever experienced in its lifetime.
A common unusual reading displays 253 Celsius, which simply means that the drive does not support the temperature reading feature. It is nothing to worry about.
POH = Power on Hours – Tells how long the drive has been running in its total lifetime.

Acoustic Test

Once activated, the drive will spin down so you can tell if noise is coming from the drive or other components (like a computer fan). The drive will remain spun down until user presses a key.
The Pop-up window will remain open for several seconds until the drive spins back up.

Set Capacity

S – Set 32 GB Capacity: Useful for ATA drives on older motherboards that will lock up if the drive is larger than 32 GB. This solution sets the drive to 32 GB. If too much capacity is lost, you can consider an add-in ATA controller that can fully support >32 GB.
R – Reset to Drive Maximum: Useful for both ATA and SATA drives that have been clipped (either manually or spontaneously) back to its maximum capacity.
M – Set Manually: Often useful for ATA and SATA drives as an alternative to attempt if the Reset to Maximum fails. Sometimes used to make all drives in a RAID array have the exact same size (use a specific number of sectors on the drive to set the size).
Q – Back to Main Menu.

Zero Fill
Main menu options: Z-Erase Drive is the zero-fill option.

Here is the Zero-fill submenu.

On the Zero Fill sub menu you have the following options:

Z – Quick Zero Fill (first 63 sectors of the drive, instantaneous)
A – Full Zero Fill (every sector of the drive, may take many hours)
F – Timed Zero fill where T adjusts the time.

Drive Information
This is the yellow text seen on the bottom of the main menu screen.

Shows hard drives detected

Device number – Used to select which drive to test.
Model number
SN – Serial Number
FW – Firmware revision – Useful on SCSI and SATA products and a few ATA products.
Controller – Chipset to which the drive is connected. Useful for some SATA and capacity issues. If it is an old chipset, the 28-bit LBA limit may apply, and so the chipset may only support SATA speeds of 1.5Gb/s.

If a drive does not show up in this area then power off the computer and confirm the drive is installed correctly.
View the installation assistance page for details on configuring various types of drives.

Log File
Log file is stored on boot media if writeable or in memory for the CD version. It is stored as: Serial#.LOG
Ex: 5NF0R4RC.LOG
To view log in software, press V.
To exit log viewer, press the Escape key.

Test Status (during a DST)

During a test the top part of the display shows a progress bar and the middle area shows the results.
After the test is complete, the middle area continues to show the result, and the top goes back to showing command options.

Bad Sector Repair (Long Test)

If bad blocks are found during a long test, a prompt will ask how to proceed.
The screen below appears at the end of the scan or if the user aborts the test if bad sectors have been discovered on the drive.

Example:

Follow the instructions on the screen to proceed.
For further information about SeaTools for DOS view the SeaTools for DOS User Guide.txt file.

Hard Disk Repair

Hard drive diagnostic software：Seagate Seatools

DATARECOVERYUNION.COM15 years ago3 years ago08 mins

Seagate creates two free hard drive diagnostic softwares – SeaTools for DOS and SeaTools for Windows. Both diagnostic tools are excellent.

1. SeaTools for Windows
SeaTools for Windows has replaced SeaTools Online and PowerMax. SeaTools for Windows is a comprehensive, easy-to-use diagnostic tool that helps you quickly determine the condition of the disc drive in your external hard drive, desktop or notebook computer. It includes several tests that will examine the physical media on your Seagate or Maxtor disc drive and any other non-Seagate disc drive.

SeaTools for Windows tests USB, 1394, ATA (PATA/IDE), SATA and SCSI drives. It installs onto your system. SeaTools for Windows is completely data safe.

User Guide about SeaTools for Windows.
Download SeaTools for Windows

2. SeaTools for DOS
SeaTools for DOS has replaced SeaTools Desktop and PowerMax. SeaTools for DOS can test Seagate or Maxtor Parallel ATA (PATA and IDE) and Serial ATA (SATA) interface disc drives. Because the software boots to its own operating system you can test your drive regardless of the OS installed on it. You can even test a new or completely blank drive. SeaTools for DOS will instruct the drive to run its built in Drive Self Test (DST) and give either a pass or fail status. If you are troubleshooting your disc drive and the DST passes, then you have a good drive!

User Guide about SeaTools for DOS.
See the tutorial on the usage of SeaTools for DOS.
Download SeaTools for DOS

Pros
• Two versions are available depending on needs
• Both versions are easy to use once installed and are completely FREE
• SeaTools for Windows tests hard drives no matter the manufacturer
• SeaTools for DOS contains a highly useful “acoustic test” for noise troubleshooting
• SeaTools for DOS is OS independent so it’s automatically compatible with ALL operating systems

Cons
• SeaTools for DOS requires ISO image burner software that novice users may have difficulty using
• SeaTools for DOS handles a maximum of only 100 errors, at which point testing has to begin again

Description
• Seagate SeaTools is available in both a Windows version and a stand-alone, bootable version for maximum flexibility.
• Tests in both SeaTools versions are easy to understand and run.
• SeaTools for Windows can test all types of internal drives including SCSI, PATA, SATA, etc.
• SeaTools for Windows can also test external drives like those based on the USB or FireWire standards.
•SeaTools for DOS features an Acoustic Test to help you determine if a noise is from your hard drive or another component.

3. Guide Review – Seagate SeaTools
Seagate’s SeaTools hard drive testing programs are some of the easiest to use of any I’ve ever worked with. The test are basic, easy to run, and generally pretty fast in my tests.

The SeaTools hard drive testing software comes in two different versions. SeaTools for Windows runs on Windows 2000, XP or Vista. SeaTools for DOS runs outside of the operating system so the tool will work on your PC no matter what OS you use.

SeaTools for Windows can perform several basic tests that can help determine the health of your hard drive. Your available hard drives and tests are easy to see when the program opens and can be ran with just a few clicks of the mouse.

You can test hard drives from any manufacturer and of any type, including PATA, SATA, and SCSI internal drives along with USB and FireWire external drives. To begin, simply download the software from Seagate’s site and install in Windows.

SeaTools for DOS can also perform the several basic tests that SeaTools fro Windows can run but it can also run a very useful Acoustic Test. This test can really save you a lot of time during the troubleshooting of a noisy internal component. It will spin the drive down until it’s completely idle, making the drive nearly silent. If you no longer hear the strange noise, the hard drive was the culprit!

With SeaTools for DOS, you can only test hard drives from Seagate and Maxtor. To begin, download either the Floppy Diskette Creator to make a bootable floppy disk (this is the easier option) or the ISO CD-ROM Image to burn to a CD. If you need help burning the CD, check out How to Burn an ISO Image File to a CD or DVD.

So if you’re comfortable burning ISO images and you want a slightly more powerful test, use SeaTools for DOS. If you’re more of a novice or you just want a quick and basic hard drive test, give SeaTools for Windows a try.

Both softwares are completely free and I highly recommend them. If you suspect that your hard drive may be failing, one or both of these tools from Seagate will help you determine what’s wrong.

How to use SeaTools for Windows

Seatools For DOS Tutorial

Creating a Diskette

SeaTools for DOS, Graphical version

SeaTools for DOS, Text Version

Hard drive diagnostic software：Seagate Seatools