USB pen problem

Cute_'n'_Quirky

My hard-drive went on a 6 week old laptop and I lost everything.

So I have been using USB pens to store everything with no problem until today.

I am getting a message that my computer doesn't recognise my usb pen.

Is there any way of getting the information off the usb pen please?

Aliktren

plug it into another PC and see if it works ?

hate to ask but did you have a backup?

Browntoa

not if the flash memory chip has failed

superscaper

I guess people will see why I deliberately steer people away from using flash as a main backup: http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=597170

superscaper

Browntoa wrote: »

not if the flash memory chip has failed

If it's the controller chip that's failed then it will be only possible to recover the data from the flash chip professionally and I don't want to even think how much that'd cost. :eek:

Cute_'n'_Quirky

You just can't win.

The hard-drive went.

CD's fail

USB pens fail

I give up

superscaper

Cute_n_Quirky wrote: »

You just can't win.

The hard-drive went.

CD's fail

USB pens fail

I give up

Depends on how you back up. If you're just relying on a flash drive then to be honest I'm not all that surprised your backup system failed. Besides whether you should use flash or not you should rely on just one back up and only one back up method. In doing so you have a multiline defence that makes it almost impossible to actually lose anything of significance. Hence my link I gave.

Cute_'n'_Quirky

Thanks for the advice.

Have just bought a Western Digital 500GB external hard drive and, fingers crossed, we won't have any more problems!

superscaper

Cute_n_Quirky wrote: »

Thanks for the advice.

Have just bought a Western Digital 500GB external hard drive and, fingers crossed, we won't have any more problems!

Don't just rely on that though. I've got a WD 500 GB external drive as well which I use to image my entire computer daily as well as store various other things. But I also backup my documents to DVD (as well as any program downloads) occasionally and I also backup my documents and my emails online daily.

Teacher2301

Just think about much a flashpen is - Free to £20 or so - not a reliable way to back up, I know that's not helpful - but try ebuyer.com and look at the external hard drives - some good bargins there and the comments by purchasers are generally very reliable.

albertross_2

CD's last decades unless your scratch them/leave them in the sun. CD/DVD is the best backup method, especially with your luck. A virus could take out your master and backup in seconds with an external hard disk.