HD Sentinel HDD and SSD Disk Health Monitor

This document is also available in a human translated Dutch version (Nederlandse versie).

HD Sentinel from www.hdsentinel.com is a memory resident disk health monitor for both hard disks and solid state drives (SSD).

All hard disks die. It’s a fact of life you better prepare for. In the first place by backing up your data. But even with your data backed up it is good to have an in advance warning when your hard disk is about to fail.

I am not a fan of non-essential utilities running in the back ground continuously at all. Many so called system monitors aim to speed up your system but little do, while at the same time taking up considerable amounts of system resources. But I am willing to make a couple of exceptions: I run an virus scanner, a backup tool … and HD Sentinel. HD Sentinel has an extremely low impact on system performance. It is as essential as running anti-virus software.

Do you recognize a good deal when you see one?

Protect up to 5 computers by HD Sentinel Professional for only $49.95

(lifetime license)

S.M.A.R.T. – Self Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology

A hard disk health monitor, monitors information that the hard disk reports about it’s own health condition. This information can be useful in predicting hard disk failure. S.M.A.R.T. is the source of the data that is used to analyse the performance and health of the hard disk (and SSD too).

Based on years of experience and data, HD Sentinel perfected it’s ability to predict hard disk failure. Unlike many simpler S.M.A.R.T. utilities it is more than just being a messenger of the data published by the hard disk. It interprets the RAW S.M.A.R.T. data and does it’s own calculations and analysis to determine the hard disk or SSD status and to predict failure.

Monitor Hard Disks, SSD, USB and RAID too!

Where most of the hard disk monitors and S.M.A.R.T. utilities are unable to monitor disks that are ‘behind’ USB and RAID controllers, HD Sentinel does work with most of those. The list of supported hardware is impressive and grows on a regular basis because HD Sentinel is one of the best maintained utilities around.

Even if you’d buy some hardware for which there is no support yet, the program includes the option to sent a test report to the developer. And you have a good chance that support for your hardware will be added soon.

HD Sentinel Std HD Sentinel Pro HD Sentinel Family
Hard disk health monitoring

  • Monitors health of hard disks, SSDs etc.
  • Surface check
  • Hardware disk tests
  • Hard disk seek time, stress tests
Hard disk health monitoring + variety of disk checks

  • Monitors health of hard disks, SSDs etc.
  • Hardware disk tests
  • Hard disk seek time, stress tests
  • Complete surface analysis, refresh, reinitialize
  • Industry-standard data destruction
  • Portable version (no installation required)
  • Scheduled hardware disk tests
Hard disk health monitoring + variety of disk checks

  • Same as Pro
  • Allows installation on 5 PCs similtanuously
Purchase – 18.00 EURO19.50 USD Purchase – 28 EURO / 29.95 USD Purchase – 49.95 EURO / 53 USD

Downloads

Free Trial

Standard Version

Pro Version

  • Download a Trial  to examine the application and test its functionality and verify hardware compatibility
  • 30 day refund policy
  • VAT: Prices are subject to VAT if you are in EU.
  • HD Sentinel License Agreement

A wealth of information

When first running the program you may feel a bit overwhelmed. Apart from being a disk health monitor it also provides you with lots of information! Consequently lots of TABs, buttons and menus are available.

HD Sentinel disk health monitor

The good news is, that if you don’t feel like it, you do not have to dig deep to get to the crucial information: Is my disk healthy or not? If all is well, HD Sentinel will report the disk status as ‘excellent’. So, if that’s all you need to know, you can now close the program and it will simply monitor the disk in the background.

Hard Disk Maintenance using HD Sentinel

For those wanting to do active hard disk maintenance, HD Sentinel is the tool of choice too. First of all the software can run S.M.A.R.T. self tests. These are tests performed by the harddisk’s firmware itself. Self tests are non destructive and can be run while you continue using your computer (although hard disk access may be slower).

Apart from the disk’s self-tests, HD Sentinel also features various surface scans and tests. Running tests on the disk allows the disk to detect errors that could otherwise go unnoticed until a specific weak area is written to.

hd sentinel surface scan

Bad sector repair

A unique feature of HD Sentinel is the ability to repair bad sectors in Windows! Normally, in order for software to write to a hard disk on the block level, it must be able to lock the disk for exclusive access. However, this isn’t possible for the disk containing your system (normally c:) drive by definition.

However, HD Sentinel is now able to repair bad sectors even on a disk that is unable to lock. Also, with regards to bad sectors and bad sector repair, a cool and also unique feature is, that HD Sentinel is able to tell you, if a file is, and what file is affected by the bad sector.

The ultimate Disk Health Monitor

In my opinion HD Sentinel is the disk health monitor of choice. And I also think that a disk health monitor isn’t optional, but it is a necessity. It’s price isn’t only friendly in relation to what it has to offer, it is friendly, period. It does not only offer a lot for the money, it just offers a lot.