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If I understand it correctly, badblocks just writes somewhat elaborate patterns to the supplied block device and reads it back. With modern hard drives doing extensive caching, sometimes have included flash storage, being able to remap defective sectors with spare ones, or SSDs doing wear leveling, of what value is just running badblocks? From my understanding, it only may set broken devices apart if the device is insanely broken, as in not having relocatable sectors left.

Should I run a SMART test before and after badblocks and compare the results or is it enough to run it alone?

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Badblocks should only be run on a conventional platter hard drive, not a SSD. A SSD has internal hardware/software to handle wear leveling issues or a failed/failing block.

What this application does is finds parts of the hard drive where it cannot write/read data correctly and will lock it out on the device level. This is fine to run if you just get a new drive (or new to you) so you can have some confidence it is operational. If you are having problems with a drive you are better off running a SMART long test and then looking at the info IDs 5, 197, 198, and 200 for a value other than zero is a warning sign to backup your data and replace the drive immediately. You should never use badblocks to recover a drive if you plan to have important data on it, odds are good the drive will continue to fail further.

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