HDD Damage... Can someone help ?

[rypson]

Hi... I dropped my laptop today.... accident... It wasn't bad I was pretty sure that everything is fine and I restart it after screen froze....

disk reading error occurred
Ctrl Alt Del to restart computer

Unfortunately windows is not loading....

I hooked disk to external case check on my other computers. Disk is "spinning", doesn't make any weird noises, however windows can't see it... For me it's simple... my HDD is in Hardware heaven... or I'm wrong ? Is there any way to rescue data from this HDD ??

I had 3 partitions 2 that I was using and one recover partition

Laptop Dell

There is nothing very very important on HDD, I have my data backed up on couple external drives, however I was in the middle of project and I want to recover that couple hours of work that I accomplished

Any advice ?? Any software that I can use to restore data from the HDD ??

If it's necessary I'll buy software to data rescue just don;t know what to buy and if the software can help...

Maybe old fashion method : freeze the HDD ?? :P

[Bleufire]

I was gonna suggest the freezing method if you didn't wanna shovel the money for it.

I don't think software can fix broken hardware in your hard drive.

[tim]

Read this.

It could be the hard drive plug came out or something. Take the drive out of the laptop and plug it into a desktop, see if you can see it. If not it's probably best to just redo the two hours work, unless it's too difficult.

[rypson]

Originally Posted by tim

Read this.

It could be the hard drive plug came out or something. Take the drive out of the laptop and plug it into a desktop, see if you can see it. If not it's probably best to just redo the two hours work, unless it's too difficult.

I'm starting to read your link....

I did connect disk to other computer... no luck... computer can;t see partition, however, when I plug USB out computer is saying that I should format disks before using.....

I lost few hours of work... and some ideas that will be difficult to recover in my head

I'm freezing HDD right now.... will see....

[rypson]

BTW

My laptop BIOS see that disk and recognize it.... just a windows is not loading....

[tim]

Who cares if windows doesn't load? Just treat it as a data disk and pull your files off.

[MCAsan]

Even better, use this as an excuse to get a Macbook....especially a Retina Macbook.

[rypson]

I wish... MAC is best solution for photographer, however... I can't afford MAC.... I wish... but I can't....

Guys would be nice if you can read my posts

Windows can't see the disk, I did connect thru USB to different computers, they are not recognizable, however BIOS can see my "broken" disk....

[tim]

Originally Posted by rypson

I wish... MAC is best solution for photographer, however... I can't afford MAC.... I wish... but I can't....

Guys would be nice if you can read my posts

Windows can't see the disk, I did connect thru USB to different computers, they are not recognizable, however BIOS can see my "broken" disk....

MAC isn't the best solution, it's a solution.

Sounds like your disk is completely stuffed sorry.

[Hopelessdfilms]

Originally Posted by rypson

I wish... MAC is best solution for photographer, however... I can't afford MAC.... I wish... but I can't....

Guys would be nice if you can read my posts

Windows can't see the disk, I did connect thru USB to different computers, they are not recognizable, however BIOS can see my "broken" disk....

I feel the need to address your issue with going APPLE, as I believe many pc users spout this as an obligation...

PRICE IS CHEAPER GOING MAC.

Whats that?

CHeaper?

Yes.

In my case and maaaannnny others I know who have made the switch this is by far the case.

For example, if you were to purchase a new mac retail, yes there is a big ticket price to get in the door. BUT! Once you're in you are now involved with a single company that will support your hardware.... for many years to come.

In multiple cases I've gotten free phone support from apple techs to trouble shoot apple computers wellllll beyond the extended apple care warranty. IE, my 6 year old G5 and Mac Pro. I've also had apple do a fully free replacement of a logic board *motherboard* for you pc users, on my older macbookpro. It was out of warranty by almost a year and they replaced it free of charge in 2 days.

The other reason its cheaper? I used to do custom pc builds and even though I was building pretty top end powerful machines, I found that as technology and software grew, my machines were getting out of date and noticeably slow every 1-1.5 years. With mac this has not been the case for me.

I still use a macbookpro before the unibody models... roughly 2008ish so its a 4 year old laptop without upgraded ram, etc and it still gets the job done. It gets the job done so well, that I haven't felt a great need to do any upgrades.

My mac pro is even older, roughly 2006-2007ish... and still going strong. Longest I used a pc build? 1.5 years.

Okay... now onto another point.

THere are OTHER ways to get macs. You don't need to go retail to buy them. Usually right before new models are announced many people hit craigslist trying to offload their older models in anticipation of a new model.

This is a super easy way to pick up working mac gear on the super cheap. Yes there are some issues with craigslist, but if you do a little bit of research you can easily get great mac gear on the cheap.

Okay, now onto your issue.

If bios is reading your disk, it is probably just 'seeing' the basic info that the disc provides. If you don't hear the drive spooling up or clicking noises, the drive is likely dead.

The only option is to try using external drive adapters usually that convert the sata/ide ports of the hard drive down to usb.... if the drive is still not connecting and working, see if you can open your windows disc utility and try reformatting the drive. At that point you risk wiping all the data but have a chance of recovering the drive so it can be used again.

Its worth a shot, but likely the disk is dead.

Data recovery is incredibly expensive and not a sure thing. In my opinion, learn the lesson now and start practicing a bulletproof redundant data backup workflow. For some this lesson must be learned multiple times before they 'get it' for others once is enough.

hope this helps.

just my .02c

[tim]

Enough the the Mac propaganda please, stay on topic.

[Bleufire]

+1 on the Mac Cool-aid crap. I love my Mac at home and my Win7 but Mac or Windows isn't the reason your HDD crashed nor will either prevent a crash.

Tim is completely right. Your HDD has drove its last day. You can either send it in for expensive recovery or just junk it and call it a day. My thought is that the computer can see the HDD controller but can't read the platters because something is borked.

By the sounds of it though, you don't have anything important that you need from it. E-cycle that thing and mark it up as a lesson learned and get a reliable backup in place.

If you find a cheap HDD you can throw it in the laptop and keep using it as a low-cost repair and put a laptop to use and save up for a backup.

I will repeat again though, THIS CAN HAPPEN IN OSX and WINDOWS! Don't believe it won't. I have had a brand new HDD break in 1.5 months in my Macbook with no drop of any sort and had a old HDD last for years in my beater Windows XP laptop with no issue.

Get what you are comfortable working with. Mac and/or Windows. both a tool.

just. my. $.03

[Merlin_AZ]

I would install Recuva, ZARecovery, RecoverMyFiles, etc. onto another computer, and attach your borked drive to it.
Run the software and see if it can find the files you are looking for.
If it can, copy the files somewhere safe.

[tim]

SSDs are great to increase performance in laptops. Back them up though, as they fail just as often as hard drives.

I image my system drive with DriveImageXML every few months, so I can create a bootable replacement if I need to... at least in theory, I've never tested it. There's no data on my OS disk, and my data is all backed up of course.

[René Damkot]

Originally Posted by tim

please, stay on topic.

Quoted for emphasis.