HDDScan

Artem Rubtsov’s free HDDScan application can be used to diagnose a variety of storage devices, like IDE and SATA hard drives, RAID volumes, or external USB drives. It provides a variety of tests that you can use to diagnose your internal or external storage device(s).

To run HDDScan on your PC, it must meet the following requirements: 1.5GHz processor or better, 256MB of RAM or more, Windows operating system (anything from Windows 2000 SP4 up to Windows 7). If you’re going to get HDDScan and use it, you should know that HDDScan should not be run from a read-only device.

The HDDScan interface can be customized with skins. Numerous skins are available for download on alphaskins.com. So download one that you like, and use it to change the way HDDScan looks.
The interface consists of two floating windows. The main window from the top lets you select a drive and easily access the tests and other features HDDScan has to offer. Below it there’s a Test Manager window that presents info on the tests you choose to perform.

HDDScan puts various tests at your disposal. They’re grouped into surface tests (verify, reading, and erasing in linear mode; reading in butterfly mode) and SMART offline tests (short, extended, and conveyance test). On top of that, HDDScan can present a lot of info about your drive, monitor the drive’s temperature, and manage a drive’s acoustic and power.

As mentioned above, HDDScan is free. You can use it for as long as you want for free.

With HDDScan, you can test a variety of internal or external hard drives.