How ScanDisk Fixes Bad Sectors (103956)
The information in this article applies to:
• Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.2
• Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.22
This article was previously published under Q103956
SUMMARY
When ScanDisk encounters a bad sector it attempts to patch the sector.
This is known as hot fixing or hot patching.
NOTE: If you are running in check mode (/CHECKONLY), ScanDisk does not
attempt to hot fix the bad sectors.
MORE INFORMATION
Hot patching is the process of taking a file that contains one or more
unreadable (bad) sectors and recovering all the data that is still
readable. Any data that lies in a bad sector is replaced by zeros.
For example, if a file occupies clusters 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, and
cluster 3 contains one or more bad sectors, ScanDisk reads as many of
the sectors from cluster 3 as possible and moves the data to a new
location (for example cluster 7). Any sectors from cluster 3 that
could not be read are replaced with sectors filled with zeros in
cluster 7. The FAT chain for the file is updated and cluster 3 is
marked bad. After this process is finished, the file occupies clusters
1, 2, 7, 4, and 5.
NOTE: This process makes the file fully readable, but the data that
was in the defective sectors is still lost. It is not possible for
ScanDisk to recover data from unreadable sectors.
| Modification Type: |
Major |
Last Reviewed: |
11/19/1999 |
| Keywords: |
KB103956 |
|