Please help me resurrect a dead hard drive

McGraw · 11-05-2007, 09:27

Hello there.

We have a hard drive here at work that needs to be sent to a data recovery specialist.

I have booted into Spinrite and have "recovered" everything.

However, although the bios/OS recognises the disk, it isn't assigning it a size and just wants to format it when I try to access it.

Is there any way for me to sort it out? I have tried fixmbr but Windows refuses to log on to the drive in the command prompt.

Thanks a lot.

Graham M · 11-05-2007, 09:48

You could try a low level format with the hard drive manufacturer's tools, but even if you manage to bring it back to life, there is every chance it could die on its **** again. Hard drives are cheap, bin it and get a new one.

McGraw · 11-05-2007, 10:35

Sorry, didn't make it clear. I couldn't care less about the drive itself.

The data is all that matters.

Nice one.

punky · 11-05-2007, 10:53

But you said you've recovered everything?

Quote:

I have booted into Spinrite and have "recovered" everything.

McGraw · 11-05-2007, 11:40

Again, should have made myself clear. According to spinrite I have recovered everything but I'm still unable to access the drive in Windows or the Command Prompt.

cmatt · 11-05-2007, 16:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by McGraw

Again, should have made myself clear. According to spinrite I have recovered everything but I'm still unable to access the drive in Windows or the Command Prompt.

so you have recovered the data and your now trying to access the drive?

whats the point? you have what you want... why not just bin the drive? It has little or no use to you now you have recovered the data off of it.

bonzoe · 11-05-2007, 17:33

He said Spinrite had "recovered" in quotes, so I think he means that it had not actually recovered the data, could have made it clearer in the original post!

Try sticking the HDD inj the fridge for a few hours as a last resort, it just might work long enough for you to recover the data. Had to resort to this last ditch resort a few weeks ago at work. When the drive reached a temperature it was happy with, it worked long enough to recover everything.

cmatt · 11-05-2007, 17:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by bonzoe

He said Spinrite had "recovered" in quotes, so I think he means that it had not actually recovered the data, could have made it clearer in the original post!

Try sticking the HDD inj the fridge for a few hours as a last resort, it just might work long enough for you to recover the data. Had to resort to this last ditch resort a few weeks ago at work. When the drive reached a temperature it was happy with, it worked long enough to recover everything.

eh? in the fridge?

... im missing a trick here....

hmmm fair do's one thing to do is try and restore the master boot record

see if i can find that app that does it

bonzoe · 11-05-2007, 18:34

The fridge is a last resort!

The drive I was trying to recover failed in the data retrieval and was no longer recognised by the BIOS. I had heard about the fridge method in a newsletter. Decided that the drive failed as it warmed up, so had nothing to loose. Initially it was too cold, but when it warmed a little, it was recognised by the BIOS and the data was recovered

Strange, but true!

cmatt · 11-05-2007, 18:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by bonzoe

The fridge is a last resort!

The drive I was trying to recover failed in the data retrieval and was no longer recognised by the BIOS. I had heard about the fridge method in a newsletter. Decided that the drive failed as it warmed up, so had nothing to loose. Initially it was too cold, but when it warmed a little, it was recognised by the BIOS and the data was recovered

Strange, but true!

FYI - i will never try that

just sounds so... wrong!

marky · 11-05-2007, 19:03

Nothing strange about it, take you fan off your cpu and see how long it works for

If the hdd is on its last legs it could just buy enough time.

But imo the drive is corrupt and will need proper software to retrieve any data thats on it.

bonzoe · 11-05-2007, 19:03

If you're desperate to recover your data and nothing else works - why not give it a try?

cmatt · 11-05-2007, 19:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by bonzoe

If you're desperate to recover your data and nothing else works - why not give it a try?

well the only corrupted drive i have ever had (well ok it wasnt showing in windows - similar symptoms as the o.p) was a simple mbr rewrite...

I jest - i would try it, but really as a last resort. Interesting concept however

setch · 11-05-2007, 19:40

Try something like this

http://www.abstradrome.com/hdd.html

Setch