If hard drive gives up?!?

Jo4

Which version of Norton Ghost should I purchase? One computer is Windows 98SE the other is Windows XP. BTW this is the external hard drive I purchased, http://www.bigpockets.co.uk/product.php?lang=&product_id=14657, as it was recommended on this site.

movieman

You may also want to check the Windows event viewer now and again: if the disk is getting unreliable then you'll probably see disk errors listed in there as a warning that you should look at replacing it.

jago25_98

It depends how dead it is.

One the one hand there are companies out there who charge thousands to rescue company data from hard drive using electron microscopes.

One the other hand the drive might be just a bit noisy or slow, in which case you could start by just

1) installing Windows again on the new drive to get a fresh start

2) plug the old drive in and copy it all across

phill79

Forget about ghosting/imaging your HD as this image will be more difficult to retrieve the work off in anything does go pear shaped and you can't then re-image another HD. All you need to do is copy the important docs off your current machine onto another HD (external) and then it can be moved to another computer very easily if you need to.

eg, if all your work is on My Documents, just go to the location of the my docs folder in C:\documents and settings\<username>\my documents, and right click and choose copy, then go the external HD and right click and choose paste.

Why make things over complicated by suggesting unnecessary things to do?

Lawbag_2

the trouble with backing up a hard drive is that you either have to set it up to do it automatically or have the disicipline to do it regularly.

Ive chosen the lazy route and gone for a Network storage box with a RAID 1 mirror using a Netgear SC101. It isnt perfect but its better than nothing

Lawbag_2

I think in the next 12 months network storage with built-in back-up protection are going to become commonplace as any other component in a computer.

I have collectively about 3,000gb spread across 3 machines and external hard drives.

Jo4

movieman wrote:

You may also want to check the Windows event viewer now and again: if the disk is getting unreliable then you'll probably see disk errors listed in there as a warning that you should look at replacing it.

How do you do this?

Jo4

Dad thinks his computer might give up soon because it has got slower than what it was. He has some programs on the computer which he no longer has the disks for but he still uses these programs and obviously if his hard drive gave up he would still want to have them rather than have to purchase them again.

What is the best soultion for Dad as I have pointed out I have an external hard drive ordered for him?

albertross_2

You have no excuses now, this is free.. get it now, the offer only lasts for another 10 days or so..

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=274307

Ghosting/Trueimaging is far less complicated than what phil79 is proposing.

eventvwr probably won't tell you your hd is on it's way out.

This might

http://www.passmark.com/products/diskcheckup.htm

or

start, run, chkdsk c: /F/R

Jo4

albertross wrote:

You have no excuses now, this is free.. get it now, the offer only lasts for another 10 days or so..

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=274307

Ghosting/Trueimaging is far less complicated than what phil79 is proposing.

eventvwr probably won't tell you your hd is on it's way out.

This might

http://www.passmark.com/products/diskcheckup.htm

or

start, run, chkdsk c: /F/R

THANKS! I am downloading it at the moment but as I am on dial up it will take forever and a day. Next priority after this is to get a broadband provider.