hard drive crash

keenonkeenon Member Posts: 1,922 ■■■■□□□□□□
icon_pale.gif my 80gb hdd that was purely for data has crashed. taking with it the 25gb of cisco material with it but worst the personal stuff that was on it.

one of the other pcs i have shows that its having a smart error but the drive still feels like its spins. does anyone have any tricks to make the drive accessible so i can remove the data?

thus far i have put the drive in the freezer and still the same.. still spins but not accessible crash.gif
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Comments

  • sprkymrksprkymrk Member Posts: 4,884 ■■■□□□□□□□
    Once or twice I have been successful by replacing the controller board portion of the drive with a replacement from an exact model of a second drive, especially if it still spins.
    All things are possible, only believe.
  • keenonkeenon Member Posts: 1,922 ■■■■□□□□□□
    its a WD800 model number WD800JB-00ETA0
    Become the stainless steel sharp knife in a drawer full of rusty spoons
  • sprkymrksprkymrk Member Posts: 4,884 ■■■□□□□□□□
    Yeah, if you have (or can get hold of) another WD 80GB you might be able to swap boards and recover your data.

    Does the BIOS still see the drive? If so, you might be able to boot with Windows (or otherwise) boot disk that can read ntfs and copy it to another drive:
    http://www.bootdisk.com/ntfs.htm
    All things are possible, only believe.
  • keenonkeenon Member Posts: 1,922 ■■■■□□□□□□
    the bios somewhat does on 1 system but not the other

    i'll try moving it again


    don't have anymore laying around i will see if i can ask around
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  • snadamsnadam Member Posts: 2,234 ■■■■□□□□□□
    sprkymrk wrote:
    Yeah, if you have (or can get hold of) another WD 80GB you might be able to swap boards and recover your data.

    Does the BIOS still see the drive? If so, you might be able to boot with Windows (or otherwise) boot disk that can read ntfs and copy it to another drive:
    http://www.bootdisk.com/ntfs.htm


    I would try that first before you start tearing up hard drisks and swapping plates and such
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  • boyles23boyles23 Member Posts: 130
    I have used an external hd enclosure several times, which connects via USB and then copy the data off from there. Good possibility of it working since the drive is still spinning up! Another option I have used was knoppix which let us access the drive but it all depends on how bad the drive is. Hope this helps, let us know.

    Regards


    Jon
  • sprkymrksprkymrk Member Posts: 4,884 ■■■□□□□□□□
    snadam wrote:
    sprkymrk wrote:
    Yeah, if you have (or can get hold of) another WD 80GB you might be able to swap boards and recover your data.

    Does the BIOS still see the drive? If so, you might be able to boot with Windows (or otherwise) boot disk that can read ntfs and copy it to another drive:
    http://www.bootdisk.com/ntfs.htm


    I would try that first before you start tearing up hard drisks and swapping plates and such

    No plate swapping, just the little printed circuit board on the bottom of the drive. Held in by like 3-4 small screws.
    All things are possible, only believe.
  • RussSRussS Member Posts: 2,068 ■■■□□□□□□□
    Hopefully the freezer treatment has not damaged anything serious. If it is spinning up I would hazard a guess that the board is doing what it should and that the problem is a NTFS error. Putting the drive in a USB caddy and firing it up after the control machine has booted has been a successful way for me to run recovery software to salvage something for a client.
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  • leefdaddyleefdaddy Member Posts: 405
    all those certs/studying and you don't have a backup? shame on you.
    Dustin Leefers
  • JDMurrayJDMurray Admin Posts: 13,023 Admin
    The freezer treatment is one one-shot thing, not a fix. You freeze the drive and hope it regains functionality long enough (5-10 minutes, usually) to copy the important data off of it. Once the drive thaws, the drive is likely to be in worse condition because of condensation.

    I have swapped controller boards on WD drive before, like sprkymrk suggested, but it's difficult. If the drive was a master, make it a slave in another computer. Sometimes when a controller goes bad it won't operate as a master anymore, but the drive will work as a slave.

    If the drive comes up as a slave, I immediately run SpinRite on it at a Level 2 setting. If the problem is not electro-mechanical, SpinRite will 99% of the time fix the drive to the point where data can be correctly copied from it.

    Good luck.
  • PlantwizPlantwiz Mod Posts: 5,057 Mod
    JDMurray wrote:

    If the drive comes up as a slave, I immediately run SpinRite on it at a Level 2 setting. If the problem is not electro-mechanical, SpinRite will 99% of the time fix the drive to the point where data can be correctly copied from it.

    Good luck.


    I was just going to post use SpinRite then saw that JD beat me to it.

    Exactly correct on the freezing a drive...It's a good tool to use, but it's a last resort.

    1. SpinRite
    2. Possible new controller board (though as much as I HATE WD drives....I wouldn't buy another on purpose)....though if it solves your problem..then it's possibly worth it.
    3. Outsource the work to a data recovery lab (many more now then a few years back...but too expensive (IMNSHO) for many drives.


    Go with SpinRite.
    Plantwiz
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  • snadamsnadam Member Posts: 2,234 ■■■■□□□□□□
    sprkymrk wrote:
    No plate swapping, just the little printed circuit board on the bottom of the drive. Held in by like 3-4 small screws.

    shows my knowledge of hardware troubleshooting icon_lol.gificon_redface.gif

    I get what youre saying now.

    either way, Id try all other possible solutions first before you start taking the drive apart.


    as some already suggested, making it the slave (or secondary, for all you politically correct people) drive in another machine is another good method of recovering data.
    **** ARE FOR CHUMPS! Don't be a chump! Validate your material with certguard.com search engine

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