Additional Information:
S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology) is a diagnostic method originally developed by IBM that at that time referred to as "Predictive Failure Analysis". This technology was developed for IBM mainframe drives to give advanced warning of drive failures. Based on this diagnostic, Compaq announced IntelliSafeTM, which was submitted to the ATA/IDE standards committees and the resulting standard was named S.M.A.R.T.
S.M.A.R.T. analyzes many of the mechanical attributes; over time, some failures can be predicted by detecting if the hard disk drive is moving out of tolerance. While the S.M.A.R.T. technology can detect upcoming issues, not all hard drive failures are predictable.
Some of the Major Hard Disk Drive manufacturers now including the S.M.A.R.T Technology in their hard disk drives are IBM, Western Digital, Maxtor, Quantum, Seagate and Fujitsu
Not all hard drive failures are predictable, but by analyzing many of the mechanical attributes over time, some failures are predictable and this is what S.M.A.R.T. does. S.M.A.R.T. measures many attributes of the user's drive over time and decides if they are moving out of tolerance.
Also see our S.M.A.R.T dictionary definition for additional information and related links to this term.
Cause:
Hard disk drive is bad or is going to fail soon.
Solution:
Backup your information and contact the manufacturer of the computer or hard disk drive for replacement or additional help. In some very rare cases the S.M.A.R.T. implementation on your computer may have issues of its own and may need to be patched before replacing the hard drive.