Question: Are there ways to tell if/when your hard drive is gonna go? 

Answer: Bad sectors will appear if a drive is constantly rewriting the same place over and over again, such as on a badly fragmented partition.  Bad sectors appearing more often than every four months is a sign to start backing up data.  \n\nWhen in doubt, buy a new drive.  If you can live with a small size (20GB or less) you can find unused ones on the cheap to put into old PCs.  If you buy two and use them as a slave for data and master for programs, it's easy to replace in the future.\n\nIf you buy a new and larger drive, partition it with programs on one partition and data on another (say, 30/30 on a 60GB drive).  It will make tracking sector errors easier down the road.
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