Hard Drive Problems - help needed please!

DilbertJones

£350 upwards for data recovery in the industry

albertross_2

Before you go putting it in the fridge, or banging it. Have you identified whether it is a logical disk (magnetic) corruption or a physical/electronic problem or failure.

Is it spinning, does it make a regular clunking sound? Does it just sound like any other disk.


Just because it won't boot, doesn't mean that the drive is dead. It could just be a logical disk corruption, .. freezing it could make things far worse..

You need to attach it as a slave, or get a usb hard disk enclosure first.. Then see if you can see it in windows. If you can, do a chkdsk on it.

bigbadgoggs

albertross wrote:

Just because it won't boot, doesn't mean that the drive is dead. It could just be a logical disk corruption, .. freezing it could make things far worse..
QUOTE]

Putting the disk in the fridge will not freeze it - it does however keep the disk from overheating while it tries to boot. Putting it in the fridge will not under any circumstances make things worse.

intel

The only problem with sticking the drive in a fridge is that whilst its a good idea
to try, you have to be really quick re-attaching and trying as alluminium in the chassis
will condensate pretty quickly and water droplets can form within the drive electronics
so whatever you do just be fore-warned and careful.

albertross_2

bigbadgoggs wrote:

albertross wrote:

Just because it won't boot, doesn't mean that the drive is dead. It could just be a logical disk corruption, .. freezing it could make things far worse..
QUOTE]

Putting the disk in the fridge will not freeze it - it does however keep the disk from overheating while it tries to boot. Putting it in the fridge will not under any circumstances make things worse.

I don't think hard disk heads are designed to run on a cushion of water, and electronics and ice, don't go together..

The OP is trying to recover her? precious data, freezing the hard disk is surely the last resort. I have done it before myself, sometimes successfully, sometimes not.. but if the drive is spinning, and being read, and the OP has a magnetic boot sector corruption, then freezing as a starting point is not a good idea..

Running HD diagnostic software is the starting point..

annie-c

OK, I'm scared now!

I've never seen inside a PC tower before and I absolutely don't know what I'm doing!

When I try to boot up the machine using the disk from ebay, it makes fairly standard whirry noises, nothing seems to be clunking around. Does that help?

Would it help if I went and tried to boot up and came back and told you what it said on the screen?

I'm sorry that I'm causing such a kerfuffle - you are all very kind to offer to help!!! :j

annie-c

B33fy wrote:

It may be possible to connect the drive as a slave drive to a working computer and read off the required data - but first have you checked that the connection cables are fully plugged in and not been dislodged in the move?

I missed this earlier - do you mean connection cables inside the tower, or just the usual ones on the outside?

albertross_2

What is the disk from ebay? Yes it would help to know what is on screen..

Clunking and ticking noises are generally bad..

B33fy means inside the tower, on the same ribbon cable as your other hard disk..

annie-c

steve_r123 wrote:

Yes, I agree, try this first, try running scan disk a few times on the poorly drive as well to see if that helps at all

How do I run scandisk on it? Is there a function for that on my disk from ebay?

Thanks, Annie

annie-c

albertross wrote:

is the disk recognised in the bios, does it try to launch windows. If so, there is hope (depending one what you have done with those disks from ebay).

What is the bios and how would I know if the disk was recognised in it please?

(I warned you all I was thick with computers....)