SMART does report to BIOS, but like many good ideas, it's not used beyond a message because a) BIOS is too simple to do anything with it, and b) what CAN you do with a flaky drive except replace it? -- Actually, think SMART's only intent is to warn of IMPENDING failure. In the too many times (I've acquired many old drives probably abused by wearing FAT tracks out with FAT32) that I've seen those warnings in BIOS, the drive was still working but not reliable. To avoid nuisance, I've turned off the warning, and used at least one 3.2 heavily for months thereafter. -- But any warning always means BACK UP NOW. -- When a drive dies, usually get nothing but a hang in BIOS, doesn't bother informing BIOS even that it has died. Online report via smartctl.exe gives ambiguous and mysterious numbers. The 250G that I mention elsewhere as slow to report to BIOS yet reliable for data returns some alarming numbers for retries and other items, but at least it's stable in its behavior.
By the way, I've seen a few HDs "refurbished" by a machine an acquaintance has, but not over a third of those tried. -- On the other hand, I actually trust "factory refurbished" better than "new", besides that they're cheaper. Odds are that any given drive won't have TWO total failures, if it actually had any in the first place (many items returned are perfectly good).