How to recover data from HDD without paying for it

  • Thread starter Thread starter tokeer.port5.com
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tokeer.port5.com

My new HP PC is just out of warranty by 2 weeks, and the hard drive
crapped out :(

Aside from the fact that HP won't help (neither will Hitachi) I am
faced the following problem of recovering data from the drive.

The symptoms are as follows:
Vista began with BSOD in normal and safe mode, tried to slave it to
another PC but it won't spin up at all.
Stuck it in the freezer for about an hour, plugged it with a paper
towel wrapped around it to collect condensation and the drive spun
up !!!!!!!!
but BIOS won't see the drive :(

I tried two ways, by slaving it to the mobo and by USB as well, cannot
see the drive.

I am thinking about taking out the platters and transplanting into
another drive (i know, big no no without a clean room)

Another idea I have is changing the logic board.

Any one else have any bright ideas?
 
Previously tokeer.port5.com said:
My new HP PC is just out of warranty by 2 weeks, and the hard drive
crapped out :(
Click to expand...
Aside from the fact that HP won't help (neither will Hitachi) I am
faced the following problem of recovering data from the drive.
Click to expand...
The symptoms are as follows:
Vista began with BSOD in normal and safe mode, tried to slave it to
another PC but it won't spin up at all.
Stuck it in the freezer for about an hour, plugged it with a paper
towel wrapped around it to collect condensation and the drive spun
up !!!!!!!!
but BIOS won't see the drive :(
Click to expand...
I tried two ways, by slaving it to the mobo and by USB as well, cannot
see the drive.
Click to expand...
I am thinking about taking out the platters and transplanting into
another drive (i know, big no no without a clean room)
Click to expand...

A sure kill without experience and the right tools.
The clean room is only part of the problem.
Another idea I have is changing the logic board.
Click to expand...
Any one else have any bright ideas?
Click to expand...

Estimate how much the data is worth to you and start
getting quotes from professional data recovery companies.


Arno
 
A sure kill without experience and the right tools.
The clean room is only part of the problem.


Estimate how much the data is worth to you and start
getting quotes from professional data recovery companies.

Arno- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

Agreed, I've already written off the drive and shopping for a
replacement. But wondered if there was a last ditch effort that I
could do to yank stuff off it before it died forever.
 
another drive (i know, big no no without a clean room)




If you have an identical HD, swap logic boards. The transplanting platters is
a poor idea.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

Giving up on the idea of opening the case, wouldn't know what to do
once it opened anyway.
Would Spinrite help in this case? I remember reading that it only
works with logical defects not physical defects such as clicking
 
Agreed, I've already written off the drive and shopping for a
replacement. But wondered if there was a last ditch effort that I
could do to yank stuff off it before it died forever.
Click to expand...

Not really. It is the right thing to ask though.

Arno
 
Giving up on the idea of opening the case, wouldn't know what to do
once it opened anyway.
Would Spinrite help in this case? I remember reading that it only
works with logical defects not physical defects such as clicking
Click to expand...

Not even that anymore. SpinRite is obsolete as it assumes
a modulation pattern that is not used today.

Arno
 
Agreed, I've already written off the drive and shopping for a
replacement. But wondered if there was a last ditch effort that I
could do to yank stuff off it before it died forever.
Click to expand...

Try GetDataBackNTFS. You may need to take the lid off the drive to check
for spinnan.
 
Try GetDataBackNTFS.  You may need to take the lid off the drive to check
for spinnan.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

If the BIOS does not see the drive, neither will any software only
recovery program

Michael
 
If the BIOS does not see the drive, neither will any software only
recovery program

Michael- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

I agree with Michael, just grasping at straws.
Looks like I will just have to learn the hard lesson

Moral of the story back up no matter what, this drive is about a year
old. they just don't make drives like they used to.
 
My new HP PC is just out of warranty by 2 weeks, and the hard drive
crapped out :(

Aside from the fact that HP won't help (neither will Hitachi) I am
faced the following problem of recovering data from the drive.

The symptoms are as follows:
Vista began with BSOD in normal and safe mode, tried to slave it to
another PC but it won't spin up at all.
Stuck it in the freezer for about an hour, plugged it with a paper
towel wrapped around it to collect condensation and the drive spun
up !!!!!!!!
but BIOS won't see the drive :(

I tried two ways, by slaving it to the mobo and by USB as well, cannot
see the drive.

I am thinking about taking out the platters and transplanting into
another drive (i know, big no no without a clean room)

Another idea I have is changing the logic board.

Any one else have any bright ideas?
Click to expand...

Which disk model is this?

Did you hear any sounds from the disk?

The best solution may be to have a system prepared in which the disk
can be copied if it can be accessed, and then wait. And try some time
later.
 
I agree with Michael, just grasping at straws.
Looks like I will just have to learn the hard lesson
Click to expand...

Think of it less than a lesson and more of an adjustment of
priorities.
Moral of the story back up no matter what, this drive is about a year
old. they just don't make drives like they used to.
Click to expand...

They make much larger and cheaper drives. Quality is not
really worse, but were people used to own one HDD, they now
have several and hence more failures. Also more people own
HDDs in the first place and so tha absolute number of people
with dead HDDs is higher today.

Still, I have moved everything that has worth to either RAID1
or two external drives. Of course the RAID1 also has backup,
usually by copying to other machines. And all HDDs get
a long SMART selftest every 14 days.

Result of that is no disk failure since I do this. The HDDs
just know that failing will not accomplish anything ;-)

Arno
 
Another idea I have is changing the logic board.
Click to expand...

This is the only option that's reasonably safe to try at home.

I once borrowed the board from a 250GB Seagate to recover data on a 400GB
model of the same series. The problem there was a small component that got
sheared off.

If you get that working, though, I would not consider it a permanent repair,
since you had trouble getting the drive to spin up initially.
 
Giving up on the idea of opening the case, wouldn't know what to do
once it opened anyway.
Click to expand...

The logic board is attached to the outside of the drive. You don't have to
open anything.
 
I agree with Michael, just grasping at straws.
Looks like I will just have to learn the hard lesson
Click to expand...
Moral of the story back up no matter what, this drive is about
a year old. they just don't make drives like they used to.
Click to expand...

Thats right, they fail a lot less often than they used to.
 
Thats right, they fail a lot less often than they used to.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

Hey guys thanks for writing back.

For Svend: the Manu is Hitachi Deskstar 400gb sata drive

For Arno: I have drives that are older than my kids still kicking, the
oldest being a compaq laptop with a 2gb drive serving as a print
server.

For Mike: the removing board and opening were two separate ideas that
I was kicking around, just to make a last ditch effort before sending
this drive to the recycling plant in the sky. The good news is that
HP has decided to replace the drive within warranty :) was hoping the
replacement drive would be the same so I can try swapping logic boards
but the drive is WD. Good in the sense that it's not another Hitachi
Deathstar but bad in the sense that I won't be able to try the swap
board trick.
 
Previously tokeer.port5.com said:
Hey guys thanks for writing back.
Click to expand...
For Svend: the Manu is Hitachi Deskstar 400gb sata drive
Click to expand...
For Arno: I have drives that are older than my kids still kicking, the
oldest being a compaq laptop with a 2gb drive serving as a print
server.
Click to expand...

Well, yes. You can get that with modern drives as well. I have
a very old IBM 1GB SCSI drive that still works. However I have
lost exactly 2 nin-mistreated HDDs in no 20 years of owning HDD,
both IBM deathstars.

I think one thing that may be different is not the drive quality,
but the effort spent on Q/A, i.e. drive quelity is better, but
the bad apples are shipped as well, while they were caught in
an aera where drives were substantially more expensive.

However, the first seagate 20MB MFM drives had 20'000h MTBF,
while today 100'000 ... 1'000'000 are customary. And the
MTBF describes the failure probability during component life
(typically 5 years).

Arno
 
Well, yes. You can get that with modern drives as well. I have
a very old IBM 1GB SCSI drive that still works. However I have
lost exactly 2 nin-mistreated HDDs in no 20 years of owning HDD,
both IBM deathstars.
Click to expand...

From the period 1993 to 1998, I replaced five WD Caviar drives (from 400MB to
3GB) under warranty. One of the replacements was itself a warranty
replacement that failed inside the original warranty period (which was 3 years
at the time). I think the only WD drive I've owned that didn't fail was the
6GB. I haven't bought a WD drive since.

I had to replace one IBM Ultrastar in 2002. That's out of about six, several
of which served for over five years. Only one Deskstar, which did not fail
before it was replaced.

I had a couple second-hand Seagates fail, but they were old when I got them,
and I had no idea how they were treated. None of my six newly-purchases
Seagates have failed thus far.

I haven't had the Samsung Spinpoints long enough to attest to any kind of
reliability.

None were in any way mistreated. The most annoying to deal with was the 400MB
Caviar, since I had to buy a box of 100 floppy disks to back it up.

Oh, and those were all personal use drives. I've got 12 Ultrastars in two
servers that have been running 24/7 for 4+ years. And 18 Seagate SATA drives
in two other servers that have been running from 1-2 years 24/7.
 
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