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"Fried" Hard Drive - Help Request



Dick Knights Mumm

Dick Knights Mumm

Take me Home Falmer Road
Jul 5, 2003
19,623
Hither and Thither
After a drop on the floor - the hard drive on my darlings laptop (Toshiba) is apparently "fried". We will be getting the drive back from the repair mob - but do the good burghers of NSC have any suggestions, tips, advice etc as to further methods of possible means of getting stuff off the drive before we give it up as a bad job ?

I thank you.
 








F

Fungus

Well-known member
NSC Patron
May 21, 2004
7,049
Truro
It obviously wasn't that "hard"...

The only possibility would be to buy some sort of "caddie" to put the drive in, effectively making it an external USB hard drive, and plug it into a PC. But that assumes the problem is with the laptop rather than the drive, and also assumes the repair mob didn't do their job properly.

Any other ideas?

[edit: doh! must type faster!]
 






Bwian

Bwian

Kiss my (_!_)
Jul 14, 2003
15,898
While we're on Hard Drives...I had an external one that was connected to my laptop. We had a Power cut so the drive's power died while the laptop carried on via its battery.

Power came back on-hard drive not seen by laptop, tried 2 other pc's, same thing.

I've tried a couple of software packages found on the internet but they don't see it either. The bloody thing is spinning (it was only a few months old so shouldn't be knackered).

NSC is full of computer experts-any recommendations for software that might be able to find its way past what is seemingly a corrupt boot sector (that's what I'm told it is) so I can get close to 1GB of stuff accessible again?

Thanks.
 


Seagulltonian

Seagulltonian

C'mon the Albion!
Oct 2, 2003
2,773
Still Somewhere in Sussex!
Always, always do a backup on a regular basis, so if a problem like this occurs, you can just reinstall. Saves lots of heartache if you can't retrieve those precious things that you want to keep.
 


Westdene Seagull

Westdene Seagull

aka Cap'n Carl Firecrotch
NSC Patron
Oct 27, 2003
21,093
The arse end of Hangleton
If the drive really is the dead bit then you could use a data recovery company - just google it. They can be a bit pricey but I guess it depends on what value you put on your data.
 




kip

kip

New member
Aug 2, 2011
610
The caddy idea is good but if you still can't access the drive you might want to try something like 'recover my files' this is software that can sometimes recover your stuff from a f***ed hard drive. I used it on a f***ed drive and was able to transfer all my files onto another drive. It is quite expensive but depends on how much you want the information back.
recovermyfiles.com/ (I can't post links as i'm new, just google it)
Hope this helps
 




perseus

perseus

Broad Blue & White stripe
Jul 5, 2003
23,458
Sūþseaxna
Sausage Sandwich Game

The Antikythera Mechanism said:
If it's been fried, you'd best use absorbent kitchen roll as this will get the oil off a treat.
Click to expand...

Sounds like the Sausage Sandwich Game.

Th external caddies (you have to specify the type of hard drive) might even be cheap enough in a local computer shop. They are useful to have anyway. If a HD is really finished you can usually hear it crank away.
 




Pondicherry

Pondicherry

Well-known member
May 25, 2007
1,033
Horsham
Assuming its a Hard Disk Drive and not a Solid State Drive, dropping a laptop will probably have caused the head(s) (the part that reads the disk) to bang into the platter (the part that holds the data). The head in normal circumstances, floats just above the platter (as the platter spins the head reads the data - a bit like a record player). The gap is tiny but dropping the laptop could cause the two to come into contact and damage the data on that part of the platter. The debris from this crash, although small, can then damage other parts of the platter as it spins. In summary, the amont of data lost could be virtually nothing to total. It is usually worth trying to recover the data and there is lots of software around to do this or you can pay someone else to do it if you are not that confident.
 


B

bhaexpress

New member
Jul 7, 2003
27,627
Kent
Pondicherry said:
Assuming its a Hard Disk Drive and not a Solid State Drive, dropping a laptop will probably have caused the head(s) (the part that reads the disk) to bang into the platter (the part that holds the data). The head in normal circumstances, floats just above the platter (as the platter spins the head reads the data - a bit like a record player). The gap is tiny but dropping the laptop could cause the two to come into contact and damage the data on that part of the platter. The debris from this crash, although small, can then damage other parts of the platter as it spins. In summary, the amont of data lost could be virtually nothing to total. It is usually worth trying to recover the data and there is lots of software around to do this or you can pay someone else to do it if you are not that confident.
Click to expand...

This is known as a 'Head Crash'.
 


NMH

NMH

Banned
Jul 6, 2003
29,540
Walk-in fridge loaded with hot blondes - Stockholm
Bwian said:
While we're on Hard Drives...I had an external one that was connected to my laptop. We had a Power cut so the drive's power died while the laptop carried on via its battery.

Power came back on-hard drive not seen by laptop, tried 2 other pc's, same thing.

I've tried a couple of software packages found on the internet but they don't see it either. The bloody thing is spinning (it was only a few months old so shouldn't be knackered).

NSC is full of computer experts-any recommendations for software that might be able to find its way past what is seemingly a corrupt boot sector (that's what I'm told it is) so I can get close to 1GB of stuff accessible again?

Thanks.
Click to expand...

That sounds more like something to do with the plug/wiring access to the HD, not the HD itself.
Take it to an electronics expert who might be able to sort it out and get you up and running
 








Dick Knights Mumm

Dick Knights Mumm

Take me Home Falmer Road
Jul 5, 2003
19,623
Hither and Thither
Pondicherry said:
Assuming its a Hard Disk Drive and not a Solid State Drive, dropping a laptop will probably have caused the head(s) (the part that reads the disk) to bang into the platter (the part that holds the data). The head in normal circumstances, floats just above the platter (as the platter spins the head reads the data - a bit like a record player). The gap is tiny but dropping the laptop could cause the two to come into contact and damage the data on that part of the platter. The debris from this crash, although small, can then damage other parts of the platter as it spins. In summary, the amont of data lost could be virtually nothing to total. It is usually worth trying to recover the data and there is lots of software around to do this or you can pay someone else to do it if you are not that confident.
Click to expand...

Ta for that. It is amazing this does not happen more often. These really must be robust units.
 


Bwian

Bwian

Kiss my (_!_)
Jul 14, 2003
15,898




Bwian

Bwian

Kiss my (_!_)
Jul 14, 2003
15,898




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