Tips & Tricks

Clean up your hard disk drive with ScanDisk

Through normal use of your computer, your hard disk drive can become cluttered and a bit messy. And folders can become cross-linked, file names can contain invalid or unknown characters or become damaged, and file names can become disassociated with their files. ScanDisk can fix these and other problems for you. It's also a good idea to run ScanDisk on a regular basis: once a week for Standard, and once a month for Thorough.

Here's how to use ScanDisk:

1. Click the Start button.
2. Point to Programs, point to Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click ScanDisk.
3. Click the drive you want to scan, and choose either the Standard or Thorough test.
4. Click Start.
   
   
   • The Standard test checks the files and folders on the selected drives for errors.
   • The Thorough test will give you further options. It performs the Standard test plus checks your hard disk drive for physical damage. You can even specify to scan areas of your disk containing only data files, or just the areas with system files, or both.
   • Both Standard and Thorough have a set of Advanced options that help you to deal with lost file fragments, invalid files, and files that overlap the same disk space. You can also choose to keep a log file of what ScanDisk finds.