From: Arno on
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Pascal Hambourg <boite-a-spam(a)plouf.fr.eu.org> wrote:
> Rod Speed a ?crit :
>> Pascal Hambourg wrote
>>
>>> Aren't pending sectors sectors waiting to be remapped because of read errors ?
>>
>> Thats not the same thing as unreadable sectors.

> Aren't pending sectors unreadable, because of read errors ?

A pending sector is one that the disk tried to read but
failed. Additional reads may recover it, but the disk
has already done the maximum it will do and will not
try by itself again. A pending sector will also become
a realocated sector on write, unless that time the
disk can read it without any problem after writing it.

Such "vanishing pending sectors" are possible when the
reason for the unreadability of the sector is external,
for example vribrarion or mechanical shock during the
initial write or a PSU that has unclean output voltages.

Arno
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From: Ant on
On 3/7/2010 9:20 AM PT, Arno typed:

> You don't need to, no disk access is possible after a kernel
> panic, hence no loging. The only thing you can do, is to
> look at the screen or to enable the serial console output and
> log that on another machine.
>
> The reason no disk access is possible is simple: A kernel
> panic only hapens when the kernel internal state is regarded
> as seriously corrupted. A disk access could then cause serious
> filesystem corruption (at least writing) and is therefore
> not done.

So Windows' blue screens with memory dumps are different?
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From: Pascal Hambourg on
Arno a �crit :
> Pascal Hambourg <boite-a-spam(a)plouf.fr.eu.org> wrote:
>> Rod Speed a �crit :
>>> Pascal Hambourg wrote
>>>
>>>> Aren't pending sectors sectors waiting to be remapped because of read errors ?
>>>
>>> Thats not the same thing as unreadable sectors.
>
>> Aren't pending sectors unreadable, because of read errors ?
>
> A pending sector is one that the disk tried to read but
> failed.

"Tried to read but failed", that looks very much like the definition of
"unreadable" to me.

[skip the rest of the explaination I already knew about]
From: Yousuf Khan on
Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Rod Speed a �crit :
>> Pascal Hambourg wrote
>>
>>> Aren't pending sectors sectors waiting to be remapped because of read errors ?
>> Thats not the same thing as unreadable sectors.
>
> Aren't pending sectors unreadable, because of read errors ?

Pending sectors are still readable, but they are weak when it comes time
to write to them. So they are pending remapping during the next write to
them.

Yousuf Khan
From: Rod Speed on
Pascal Hambourg wrote
> Rod Speed wrote
>> Pascal Hambourg wrote

>>> Aren't pending sectors sectors waiting to be remapped because of read errors ?

>> Thats not the same thing as unreadable sectors.

> Aren't pending sectors unreadable, because of read errors ?

Not necessarily.