Hitachi Disk Tools
By Misty Faucheux
Hitachi is a Japanese technology company that specializes in software programs, servers, hard disk drives and computers. If something goes wrong with one of your hard disk drives, Hitachi provides you with free disk drive diagnostic and management tools, which you can download from the Hitachi website.
Feature Tool
This tool allows you to change the settings and/or options for your advanced technology attachment (ATA) hard disk drives, and it runs when your computer is starting up. To use this program, you must download the software and then create a bootable CD. It is compatible with the Windows and Linux operating systems, and it supports 48-bit addressing, which allows you to add more memory to your integrated development environment (IDE) hard disk drive. Another feature allows you to adjust the power modes and the ultra direct memory access (UDMA) protocol settings, which then allows you transfer data from your hard disk drive to your random access memory (RAM). You can also reconfigure the serial advanced technology attachment (SATA) interface. The Feature Tool is designed specifically for the Hitachi Travelstar and Deskstar ATA hard disk drives.
Fitness Test
The Drive Fitness Test (DFT) is a tool for checking the health of your hard disk drives, including your IDE, SATA, Parallel ATA and small computer system interface (SCSI) drives. It will run tests on your system without compromising or writing over data to determine why your disk drive will not start up or keeps crashing. It will also create data logs of any drive parameters. There are three scan levels: a full scan, a quick scan and a customizable scan, where you determine what drive or area of a drive to scan. This tool is compatible only with x86 processors.
Align Tool
The Hitachi Align Tool helps you determine whether or not your disk drive is partitioned properly (disk partitioning involves breaking up a hard disk drive in different virtual drives, allowing you to create independent drives on your computer). This tool will help ensure all your data sectors are aligned correctly, and it will also help you determine whether or not data is being correctly written on and read from the drive. This tool is compatible only with Windows operating systems.
OGT Tool
The OGT Diagnostic Tool allows you to run tests on your disk drive to determine whether or not it is working properly, and it also lets you know why a particular disk drive has failed. This tool is compatible with the Windows operating system, and it is also compatible with the Ultrastar 15K73, DK32xx and 10K300.
Writer Bio
Misty Faucheux became a freelance writer in 1998 and has been an editor since 2004. She has written for a variety of websites and blogs, specializing in topics ranging from digital photography to computer systems to digital media. Faucheux received a Bachelor of Arts in communications from Loyola University New Orleans.