Thanks for letting me know, Eric!
It seems to me everything is good. (But what do I know!) Here is the results:

hdparm /dev/sda1
 
  multcount    = 16 (on)
  IO_support  =   1 (32-bit)
  readonly      =   0 (off)
  reahead       = 256 (on)
  geometry     = 4863/255/63, sectors =  55285760, start = 2048

hdparm /dev/sda2
 
  multcount    = 16 (on)
  IO_support  =   1 (32-bit)
  readonly      =   0 (off)
  reahead       = 256 (on)
  geometry     = 4863/255/63, sectors =  2, start = 75769854

hdparm /dev/sda3
 
  multcount   = 16 (on)
  IO_support =   1 (32-bit)
  readonly     =   0 (off)
  reahead      = 256 (on)
  geometry    = 4863/255/63, sectors =  20480000, start = 55287808

hdparm /dev/sda
 
  multcount   = 16 (on)
  IO_support =   1 (32-bit)
  readonly     =   0 (off)
  reahead     = 256 (on)
  geometry   = 4863/255/63, sectors =  78125000, start = 0



On Sat, Feb 18, 2012 at 8:07 AM, Technomage Hawke <technomage.hawke@gmail.com> wrote:
now I remember what the other tool was: hdparm. that tool will tell you what the SMART status is on the HDD.

-eric

On Feb 18, 2012, at 2:42 AM, Stu wrote:

> Just a suggestion, have you thought about giving UBCD a try? There's a bunch of software tools on it, most of which are way beyond me, but I have managed to salvage a couple of hard drives with it in the past.
>
> http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
>
>
> On 02/17/2012 04:27 PM, Technomage Hawke wrote:
>> you can load a live DVD into the system and then try one of the many HDD test tools (badblocks with no options is a safe bet and will tell you almost immediately if there are any problems). I know there is another command line tool that can test drive throughput and read the SMART tables on the controller. I can't remember its name off hand, but it is a good one to test the drive electronics.
>>
>> -eric
>>
>> On Feb 17, 2012, at 10:05 AM, Michael Havens wrote:
>>
>>> Yep.... I think I had a hard disk failure. I restarted my computer and was presented with:
>>>
>>>      error: unknown filesystem.
>>>      grub rescue>
>>>
>>> I then typed 'ls' and the response was
>>>
>>>      (hd0) (hd0,msdos5) (hd0,msdos3) (hd0,msdos1) (fd0)
>>>
>>> which is two partitions, the swap drive, and the floppy disk
>>> how do I verify my suspicion of drive failure?
>>> funny how all this happened just as I was attempting to back it up.
>>>
>>> --
>>> :-)~MIKE~(-:
>>> ---------------------------------------------------
>>> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
>>> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings:
>>> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss
>> ---------------------------------------------------
>> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
>> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings:
>> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss
>>
>
> ---------------------------------------------------
> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings:
> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss

---------------------------------------------------
PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings:
http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss



--
:-)~MIKE~(-: