SUPER MEGA PANIC! help!

AleksanderLoesch

AleksanderLoesch

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Hi all:wave:,

:'(:'( the "family" PC has died! The main problem is that the hard drive is unhappy. Its not "recognised" by the pc, or 10 other PCs that the kind people in the repair shop tried it on.

Its got all my school/college work on it from GCSE, through A-Level, to my current college work on it! AND! all my mums website design stuff, and most of my dads sciency-work stuff:eek::eek: +my pics (but they are on a laptop too)

Because its not working on a PC apparently the only way to get the data off is to spend quite a few hundred quid on some CSI-esque data recovery, which I/we can't afford right now (Central London is twice the price of anywhere else!)

Just wondering if theres anyone out there who has any idea whatsoever on what I could try dooing to save this wittle disky:shrug:

I know its partially my fault for not backing everything up often enough, (well, tis done quite often, was due to be done this weekend:bang:) -but the back up external hard drive isn't working either due to a power problem from the plug.

Anyway, any help/suggestions would be amazingly greatly appreciated, -all my college and repeated a-level coursework due in next week is on there:'(:eek:

I will have to owe everyone on here many rounds of :beer:s to say thanks for this!

Cheers,
Aleks
 
Could try a USB caddy from Maplins? Means you can plug it in as plug and play to another comp and see if that works?

Not an expert so just a suggestion!
 
if you have some extreme mem cards, try the software that came with them??
 
you won't like the answer
but if you try and fiddle with it you may lose the contents forever
I know it's expensive, but a disk recovery company is the way to go
I used www.cbltech.com when SWMBO's PC went to the great IT department in the sky

oh AND MAKE BACKUPS!

horse - stable door - bolted
 
I know, its a bad idea me+electronics:lol: I will have to find a decent expert recovery place me thinks, its hard to do in london as so many of PC repair people are cowboys...

Im rather angry at myself as I was going to wait till the weekend to back up, and now this happened lol, AND! i was gonna try mozy for the first time as well....
 
What make / model drive is it ?. (should say on the drive)
 
mmcp42 said:
you won't like the answer
but if you try and fiddle with it you may lose the contents forever
I know it's expensive, but a disk recovery company is the way to go
I used www.cbltech.com when SWMBO's PC went to the great IT department in the sky

oh AND MAKE BACKUPS!

horse - stable door - bolted
Click to expand...

Its definetly a case of the horse-n-stable door....

cheers for linky! will give em a call now!
 
could use more info...what does it mean not "recognised" ? only by windows or BIOS as well... ?
 
mrgubby said:
What make / model drive is it ?. (should say on the drive)
Click to expand...

-Bah! its at the repair place still, I have the name/model written down somewhere, will dig it up.


bastic said:
could use more info...what does it mean not "recognised" ? only by windows or BIOS as well... ?
Click to expand...

-Its exactly what the "freezer solution" link says: (though Im not gonna put mine in the freezer!)
http://geeksaresexy.blogspot.com/2006/01/freeze-your-hard-drive-to-recover-data.html

Basically, clicking (motor is broken apparently) when I run diagnostics (F12) on the hard drive the PC says no hard drive installed/recognised.

then press F1 to re-boot, F2 to run set up utility. when you press F1, the same message appears. and so on.

I am really:bang::bang::bang::bang::bang::bang::bang:myself over this:lol:
 
if it is not recognised by the bios then it is likely that there is an electronics fault in the controller. This means that the data (in general) on the magnetic disk will be ok. What a recovery company is likely to do (under controlled conditions) will be to remove the disk platter and put it into a donor drive, and therefore gaining access to the data contained on it.

If the data is as valuable as you say the a few hundred quid doesnt seem a very high price to pay...it all comes down to how much you value the data.
 
Yv said:
..and also is it making funny noises, normal whirring noises, or no noise at all?
Click to expand...

well, at first it was making a clicking/clunking noise when you tried to switch the PC on, then after a long while doing that it stopped that and didn't do it again.

The repair people said that its the motor that was making the noise -meaning that its broken...
 
AleksanderLoesch said:
-Bah! its at the repair place still, I have the name/model written down somewhere, will dig it up.




-Its exactly what the "freezer solution" link says: (though Im not gonna put mine in the freezer!)
http://geeksaresexy.blogspot.com/2006/01/freeze-your-hard-drive-to-recover-data.html

Basically, clicking (motor is broken apparently) when I run diagnostics (F12) on the hard drive the PC says no hard drive installed/recognised.

I am really:bang::bang::bang::bang::bang::bang::bang:myself over this:lol:
Click to expand...


ok if its the motor then the same solution will apply, basically recover the magnetic disk to another drive. You could do it yourself if you have all the tools, and a dust and static free environment....otherwise why not pay the pros to do the job.
 
lazaroonie said:
if it is not recognised by the bios then it is likely that there is an electronics fault in the controller. This means that the data (in general) on the magnetic disk will be ok. What a recovery company is likely to do (under controlled conditions) will be to remove the disk platter and put it into a donor drive, and therefore gaining access to the data contained on it.

If the data is as valuable as you say the a few hundred quid doesnt seem a very high price to pay...it all comes down to how much you value the data.
Click to expand...

good to hear that the data is (probably) ok! and I do seriously value the stuff on the disk, but at the moment (due to this annoying reccesion amongst other things!) theres just no way we can afford to get it done:( am looking what cameras I can sell at the moment!

oh well, im sure I will work something out! Thanks all ever so much for the help!
 
If the data on there is important you've gotta send it to the pros.

I've tried the freezer trick in the past but not had it work.
 
Seagate drives had a firmware bug that stopped the BIOS from recognising them after a random time, if so I *think* seagate has software to fix it .

Ps. I've done the freezer trick on 3 drives, worked everytime :)
 
hyakuhei said:
If the data on there is important you've gotta send it to the pros.

I've tried the freezer trick in the past but not had it work.
Click to expand...

The pro's it is then! Will work out something, somehow to pay for it:lol:

Can anyone recomend a good place? I searched on google, but I have no idea how to tell one company from the next!

Cheers:thumbs:

have many
:beer::beer::beer::beer::beer::beer::beer::beer: 's on me!
 
If the drive isn't even recognised by the computer then software won't be any help here guys!!

Only option here is to pay megabucks to a professional data recovery firm.. they will open the disk up and put the internals into other hardware which can read the data.

Hope you get it sorted but it will be expensive.

Try this link http://www.ipdra.org/data-recovery-directory/
 
It might be worth trying it as a second drive (you may have to swop over the jumper connection on the back) sometimes this helps, although I would have thought the shop would have tried that.
It is possible to swop the platters over yourself if you can find another identical model drive, but you do risk further damage or data loss. Only you know how important your data is, and what it's worth.
One other trick if you have any contacts in the police they may be able to help, they have specialists in just data recovery, depends who you know. Wayne
 
Maybe you could look for a 2nd hand drive (the same drive) which works, then use that for to mount the disks in put that in the comp.

Look at ebay or similar.

Of course you have to be careful if you do it yourself but it will save you a lot of money. If you do get some money, send it to the pro's and think of it as a lesson learnt for next time.
 
Am very sceptical of the freezer trick myself - tried it once & didn't work for me, but if the data's really important then that could well foul things up worse.

If you're data is worth it then don't try to save money, send it off to a specialist. I've used Retrodata very happily in the past, as has one of my customers. The guy that runs it is a very nice bloke and has an excellent reputation on the UK computing newsgroups. Looks like you're looking at about £350 inc VAT these days.

Stroller.
 
BellyBoy said:
Maybe you could look for a 2nd hand drive (the same drive) which works, then use that for to mount the disks in put that in the comp.

Look at ebay or similar.

Of course you have to be careful if you do it yourself but it will save you a lot of money. If you do get some money, send it to the pro's and think of it as a lesson learnt for next time.
Click to expand...

Not being rude but this is a really stupid idea. Hard drives are assembled and opened up for recovery in the most extreme conditions of cleanliness. The gap between the read head and the disc is so minute that a single particle of smoke is many times the size of this gap. Should it hit the head then it would be like a demolition wrecking ball hitting your body. Think how much more would be introduced inside should you open up a drive inside your own living room.
 
If you really need the files (and it seems like you you do) you'll have to pay the man :-(
 
"Basically, clicking (motor is broken apparently) when I run diagnostics (F12) on the hard drive the PC says no hard drive installed/recognised.then press F1 to re-boot, F2 to run set up utility. when you press F1, the same message appears. and so on."



After running the diagnostics, I wonder if the drive can be seen as there can be a big difference between "not installed" and "not recognised".

I have had drives in the past not detected, thats a problem but I have had drives not recognised and with a lot of patients and specialised software, recoved all data from these. Just because the Bios can't detect the details of the drive doesnt mean that it is unrecoverable by software.

If a computer shop has tried 10 machines and I assume they have tried specialist software such as http://www.ontrackdatarecovery.co.uk/ (which saved me in the past) then i think the advise to send the drive to be mechanically fixed is the right way to go...I certainly do not suggest you attempt to fix it at home...you will more than likely make things worse.

How many computer shops have you taken the drive to? Does it hurt to try another to get a second opinion, like you said, some shops are just rubish...

Hope this helps
 
MisterE said:
Not being rude but this is a really stupid idea. Hard drives are assembled and opened up for recovery in the most extreme conditions of cleanliness. The gap between the read head and the disc is so minute that a single particle of smoke is many times the size of this gap. Should it hit the head then it would be like a demolition wrecking ball hitting your body. Think how much more would be introduced inside should you open up a drive inside your own living room.
Click to expand...

I have seen drives opened up in normal working places (not mega clean) and rebuilt by swopping the platters, they all worked ok after. While it's not a great idea I'll admit, it is a last resort for someone who needs the data and can't maybe afford £350-ish. I'd be very supprised to find every data recovery company has a sterile room with filtered air, and a blower airlock, I suspect many just use a normal clean room. Wayne
 
If the drive doesn't work in another PC, or in a usb caddy then the only real option is to send it away to a specialist. If the control board has gone then we've had success in the past with swapping these with identical drives, but to be honest usually it's a head/disk collision problem.

I'd use ontrack data recovery. We've used them at work and they are very good at recovering lost data.

At no point be tempted to open the disk (unless you've finished with it and are robbing the magnets - very strong).


There's no substitute for regular backups...
 
If you really cannot afford a specialist repair and the data is lost without it you can try removing the disc drive, holding it and spinning the drive to get the platters moving, then quickly reconnecting it and starting up.
There is a danger that the heads will collide with the platters but I have used this on work computers with no problems until a new drive has been installed, on one occasion I did it every day for a couple of weeks.
If you do get it going do not turn the computer off until you have backed everything up as it may not start again.
 
Suvv said:
If you really cannot afford a specialist repair and the data is lost without it you can try removing the disc drive, holding it and spinning the drive to get the platters moving, then quickly reconnecting it and starting up.
There is a danger that the heads will collide with the platters but I have used this on work computers with no problems until a new drive has been installed, on one occasion I did it every day for a couple of weeks.
If you do get it going do not turn the computer off until you have backed everything up as it may not start again.
Click to expand...

oh my god... :cuckoo:

the tick of death is usually terminal. once a drive starts ticking its time to get your data off.

as mentioned you could try it as a 2nd drive in a friends computer or in a USB caddy but if its not recognised at all i wouldnt hold much hope to be honest.

your only other option would be spending some serious cash to get a pro to take the data off. then, once youve replaced the drive in your computer get a 2nd external USB drive to make backups to.

lesson learned the hard way im afraid..
 
cheers all for all your help and advice!

sorry I haven't been able to reply, its been hard getting to the interweb without that PC!

After reading through this, I guess I will have to save up for a while and *hope* to get a pro to do it before my courseworks due in. Probably won't make it but hey, its worth a shot.

I wont be freezing/DIY -taking it apart at home my harddrive though, its too risky really!

anyway, as I said, thanks ever so much for the help! I have to say i'm supprised at how naive I was to think I could (possibly) do it myself at home:lol:

not to threat, despite the lacking of cash, I will somehow get it seen to!

Cheers, :thumbs::D:)
 
I have done data recovery as part of my job so here is the low down....

If the bios recognises the drive then I have software that can recover the contents even if you have reformatted your drive :)

If the drive just disappears without making clunking and crashing noises then I have software that can talk to most brands of drive and can often fix the problem (not guaranteed).

If the drive starts making noises and then cannot be read but the bios reads it then the first lot of software can often get the image off the drive and retrieve most of your data.

then we get to the serious stuff.....

If the drive just stops working without making any clunking noises and is not recognised by the bios then it COULD be the drive electronics. We used to keep the circuit boards off dead harddrives and just replace them, often getting the drive to instantly work again. This was a few years ago when the electronics were often screwed to the base of the drive with maybe 2 or 3 ribbon cables connecting them to the sealed metal box that is the shell...

If the drive clunks and grinds and then fails (I THINK THIS IS YOU!) - Then this is the most serious problem and usually requires the drive to be disassembled. We didn't do this ourselves BUT I have visited the company which we sent our stuff to and this is how they would do this. They had a special box similar to a grinder cabinet that exerts a positive pressure of scrubbed air into it. You work on the drive inside the box using gloves and can disassemble the drive and swap the platters with those in the same model drive. Once you have done this the drive is then attached to dedicated hard drive imager (although a normal computer running imaging software could do this virtually as well) and the drive is imaged onto a NEW drive. Once you have the new image the SAME software is used to retrieve the contents that I would have used for step one.

The reality is that they get more expensive as you go down the list. It will cost you maybe 200-300 pounds to have your drive imaged if the motor has failed then you can recover the contents. The freezer trick is risky but does sometimes work if the bearings are the problem. Basically they heat up and sieze so if you stick the drive in the freezer it stops this for a short time. A safer alternative is freezer spray or even putting the drive inside a sealable plastic bag with lots of those little crystal bags then placing bags of frozen peas on top. The freezer method is not really the best but may work, it all depends on how much you want that data!!

It might be possible to stick the drive on another computer and see if the bios reads the drive. Some faults make it so that some controller chips have difficulty whilst others might manage it.

Shame it is not one of the first things in the list as I have the software here now!

Oh well good luck and don't be tempted to do something rash. The pros cannot get the data back if you have made it worse OR it may cost you more!
 
As you have your school and college stuff on there how about speaking to the head of IT at either place and ask if they know someone who can help you? Or if you have a university nearby ask their compuing dept.Its worth being cheeky and asking especially as its your A Level stuff.
 
AleksanderLoesch said:
-Its exactly what the "freezer solution" link says: (though Im not gonna put mine in the freezer!)
Click to expand...

Why not? You said it yourself - the professional repair is too costly. I'd leave it there for a day or two - no rapid freezing though - it does not damage any magnetic stuff so you won't reduce your chances of recovery by doing that. I'd say try it and then seek professional help.

I'd personally would also tried a suggested approach by using parts from another drive - I'd get the same drive elsewhere (same model), diassemble it and replace disks from your broken one into a new. It will cost as much as the new one but still be cheaper than professional recovery - and it's not a very complex job (but you have to be reasonably careful).
 
cowasaki said:
I have done data recovery as part of my job so here is the low down....

If the bios recognises the drive then I have software that can recover the contents even if you have reformatted your drive :)

If the drive just disappears without making clunking and crashing noises then I have software that can talk to most brands of drive and can often fix the problem (not guaranteed).

If the drive starts making noises and then cannot be read but the bios reads it then the first lot of software can often get the image off the drive and retrieve most of your data.

then we get to the serious stuff.....

If the drive just stops working without making any clunking noises and is not recognised by the bios then it COULD be the drive electronics. We used to keep the circuit boards off dead harddrives and just replace them, often getting the drive to instantly work again. This was a few years ago when the electronics were often screwed to the base of the drive with maybe 2 or 3 ribbon cables connecting them to the sealed metal box that is the shell...

If the drive clunks and grinds and then fails (I THINK THIS IS YOU!) - Then this is the most serious problem and usually requires the drive to be disassembled. We didn't do this ourselves BUT I have visited the company which we sent our stuff to and this is how they would do this. They had a special box similar to a grinder cabinet that exerts a positive pressure of scrubbed air into it. You work on the drive inside the box using gloves and can disassemble the drive and swap the platters with those in the same model drive. Once you have done this the drive is then attached to dedicated hard drive imager (although a normal computer running imaging software could do this virtually as well) and the drive is imaged onto a NEW drive. Once you have the new image the SAME software is used to retrieve the contents that I would have used for step one.

The reality is that they get more expensive as you go down the list. It will cost you maybe 200-300 pounds to have your drive imaged if the motor has failed then you can recover the contents. The freezer trick is risky but does sometimes work if the bearings are the problem. Basically they heat up and sieze so if you stick the drive in the freezer it stops this for a short time. A safer alternative is freezer spray or even putting the drive inside a sealable plastic bag with lots of those little crystal bags then placing bags of frozen peas on top. The freezer method is not really the best but may work, it all depends on how much you want that data!!

It might be possible to stick the drive on another computer and see if the bios reads the drive. Some faults make it so that some controller chips have difficulty whilst others might manage it.

Shame it is not one of the first things in the list as I have the software here now!

Oh well good luck and don't be tempted to do something rash. The pros cannot get the data back if you have made it worse OR it may cost you more!
Click to expand...

thanks! that really is a help! -I am looking at my "options" now!:D

ladysue said:
As you have your school and college stuff on there how about speaking to the head of IT at either place and ask if they know someone who can help you? Or if you have a university nearby ask their compuing dept.Its worth being cheeky and asking especially as its your A Level stuff.
Click to expand...

-I have thought of that already! College was no help (IT guy only knows how to block proxy servers!) but my dad works for UCL, and he is trying to persuade them to have a look if we are lucky, but they don't really specialise in this kind of stuff apparently:shrug:


dalex_257 said:
Why not? You said it yourself - the professional repair is too costly. I'd leave it there for a day or two - no rapid freezing though - it does not damage any magnetic stuff so you won't reduce your chances of recovery by doing that. I'd say try it and then seek professional help.

I'd personally would also tried a suggested approach by using parts from another drive - I'd get the same drive elsewhere (same model), diassemble it and replace disks from your broken one into a new. It will cost as much as the new one but still be cheaper than professional recovery - and it's not a very complex job (but you have to be reasonably careful).
Click to expand...

I will *probably* use the freezer trick eventually, once my hair is pulled out and theres 2 days before the deadline:lol:, but for now I don't want to make the situation worse (even by chance) so I am waiting to see what happens with getting a pro to do it.

Cheers all! I really owe so much to this board now! I will have to do a 365day's thread of thank you's and helpful advice:lol:!
 
MisterE said:
Not being rude but this is a really stupid idea. Hard drives are assembled and opened up for recovery in the most extreme conditions of cleanliness. The gap between the read head and the disc is so minute that a single particle of smoke is many times the size of this gap. Should it hit the head then it would be like a demolition wrecking ball hitting your body. Think how much more would be introduced inside should you open up a drive inside your own living room.
Click to expand...

I see your point but I didn't mention doing it in the living room or anywhere else which is dirty.
I have done this a few times, in clean conditions (even with latex gloves and a mask to prevent any dirt or condensation getting on the drive internals). I fix computers so I understand the importance of clean environments.
Although, I should have said to do it in a clean environment.
But good point none the less :)
 
BellyBoy said:
I see your point but I didn't mention doing it in the living room or anywhere else which is dirty.
I have done this a few times, in clean conditions (even with latex gloves and a mask to prevent any dirt or condensation getting on the drive internals). I fix computers so I understand the importance of clean environments.
Although, I should have said to do it in a clean environment.
But good point none the less :)
Click to expand...

There are always people who are more capable and you appear to be one of them, given the success that you've had. I was going to add that if you can't afford to have it done professionally and you have nothing to lose then by all means give it a go. I have a few dead drives laying around and I might have a go myself and see what happens. I've got an open one in front of me now - had it here like this for years as a desk item. It looks like getting the discs back between the heads could be tricky.
 
I have actually swapped the innards of two drives on my computer desk and the drive survived. I wasn't wearing gloves and it was not a clean room BUT I wouldn't think that the drive would have lasted too long afterwards. It was just to save someone's iTunes folder :)

He had 2 identical 160Mb drives with 80Mb of music on one of them. He bought a new 500Gb drive and I imaged the boot drive onto the new 500Gb drive freeing that drive up then I dismantled both drives and swapped the innards around. Then copied the music directory to the 500Gb drive too. I REALLY would not advise people to do this though but the value of the drives was negligible and the value of the music folder did not warrant a professional restoration plus the other drive was identical and there!
 
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