Is there hard drive initialization software that spares bad blocks?
Western Digital External hard drive bad blocks drive initialization
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If you do the Write All Zeroes option in Disk Utility (on a Mac), this is supposed to set aside all the bad blocks (be forewarned, it can take a loooong time--we're talking many hours here for a large drive.)
That said, if a drive has confirmed bad blocks, I personally don't consider it worth the risk; in most cases, blocks going bad is a condition that continues to worsen. I've had one drive that behaved for a long time after a Write All Zeroes format; and multiple drives that just kept failing. So I don't bother any more. Drives are inexpensive enough, usually, that's it's wiser to replace them.
Unfortunately your drive is external, so SMART Utility won't be able to access its self-monitoring attributes. Programs like TechTool Pro (Mac) can do a surface scan and alert you of bad blocks; this takes a long time and can further degrade a failing drive, so back up your data first. Disk Warrior (Mac) can also put up messages while it runs, like "Speed inhibited due to drive malfunction", which can indicate bad blocks, and if you run it from a hard drive and not the CD, the system log often has useful information about the target drive.
I've had good luck with warranty replacements for drives with bad blocks. All the manufacturers provide testing software which only runs on Windows (I don't do Windows), but they have always honored the printout I include in the returned drive showing confirmation of a sector (block) problem.
Here is a British data recovery company whose web site has some fascinating details about all kinds of hard disk failures: http://www.dataclinic.co.uk/recovery-har...
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SMART software can work with certain external drives. It depends upon the chip used in the USB/Firewire adapter.
Note that bad blocks are managed automatically by the drive's onboard controller. In normal circumstances, you'll never see evidence of bad blocks unless you check the SMART data.
And like Colleen says, if your drive shows it has more than few bad blocks, I'd start looking for a replacement and consider this drive to be on its last legs. You might continue to use it to hold music or videos that you already have stored away in some other format.
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"Note that bad blocks are managed automatically by the drive's onboard controller." Thanks for that clarification, cityzen. Every drive comes with a number of spare blocks that will automatically be used. But once that supply is depleted, you're looking at possible data loss. Again, if a drive shows any blocks replaced or pending replacement, I replace the drive.
Oops, forgot to add: yes, some external USB and FW (and even more eSATA) enclosures support SMART. But I haven't been able to find one yet.
Google engineers did some heavy-duty statistical analysis of hdd failures in their VAST server farms. The overwhelming precursor of hdd failures was bad blocks showing up in the SMART data. Replace that hdd if it has bad blocks!
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