I always suspect a fault on a new HDD.
Better safe than sorry.
( Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 29 May 2009, 0:29, archived)

It'd be quicker to run something like the SiSoft SANDRA hard drive performance test.
You could run it at least 5 times and still be quicker than the long SMART test. It would also show up failures that might otherwise take a few days of use to surface. It also lists the SMART data, so you can see if you're getting any bad sectors between runs.
( Dave Trouser ; the people's choice - 75% agree, Fri 29 May 2009, 0:44, archived)

Can you get that for Linux?

( Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 29 May 2009, 0:47, archived)

Probably not.
You must surely have a Windows box sat about somewhere though?
( Dave Trouser ; the people's choice - 75% agree, Fri 29 May 2009, 0:53, archived)