[Smartmontools-support]Meaning of "Current_Pending_Sector"?

[Georg A. <ac...@in...>]

Hi,
I have a Maxtor 4G160J8 (160GB), which produced (out of the blue) a lot of
"UncorrectableError"-messages in the syslog, making the FS almost unusable.
smartd only reported the ATA errors in the log, the disk itself still 
thinks it's healthy ("PASSED").

"smartctl -t long/short" leaves entries in the error log:

SMART Self-test log, version number 1
Num  Test_Description    Status                  Remaining  LifeTime(hours)
LBA_of_first_error
# 1  Short captive       Completed: read failure       60%      2473
0x0880003f
# 2  Extended off-line   Completed: read failure       30%      2472
0x0880003f

All of this seems to be related to the only change in the attributes:

  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0033   253   253   063    Pre-fail  Always
-       2
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0008   252   252   000    Old_age   Offline
-       1
197 Current_Pending_Sector  0x0008   252   252   000    Old_age   Offline
-       1
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   0x0008   252   252   000    Old_age   Offline
-       1

I have other disks with more reallocated sectors (working without problems),
but only this one has "current pending sectors". I've googled around, but
found no indication what this really means to the health state of the disk.
How can I get rid of this pending sector? Or should I try the Maxtor
diagnosis tool?

Thanks...
-- 
         Georg Acher, ac...@in...
         http://wwwbode.in.tum.de/~acher
         "Oh no, not again !" The bowl of petunias