need to save my sister's hdd

[splat]

my sister called me the other night saying that her computer mysteriously rebooted itself and when it restarted, it was making an odd noise and it would not boot in to windows. Instinctively, I knew it was a hard drive issue.

I've been playing with her computer and the hard drive for two days now, and the hard drive will be recognized by the bios but refuses to be accessible in any OS. The drive is the secondary drive in her machine, but she says it has some important things on it that she needs saved, so I'm trying my hardest to access the drive and copy the contents before I simply trash it.

I can boot in to her windows install, but the drive does not show up, not even in Computer Management. When I tried booting several linux live cd's (knoppix, LFS, Puppy), the drive would cause the primary ide channel to time out, making both hard drives inaccessible. I threw the drive into my FreeBSD box, and all I get is drive errors back from it. I can't mount it and I can't use `dump` to get a raw copy of the contents. I even threw the drive in the freezer for a day at the suggestion of some one else who told me it would shrink the bearings and possibly give me access to the drive for a short amount of time.

So my question to all of you is, what else can I do to try and save the data off this drive?

 

[lekyiscool]

only thing i can think of is to take them to hhd recovery center but that costs alot of money

 

[splat]

i'm still hopefull because the drive does get picked up by the BIOS, it's just a matter of getting access to it in a manner where I can copy the data off. which, even if I can access it, theres no gaurantee that the data will transfer off without getting corrupted by disk errors.

I hope some one can come along with a magical solution for me.

 

[redduc900]

GetDataBack for NTFS 3.03
http://www.runtime.org/gdb.htm

 

[splat]

GetDataBack for NTFS 3.03
http://www.runtime.org/gdb.htm

i was trying to boot in to XP last night to give that a try, and it was taking forever, then I heard this "KA-CHUNK!" and the drive went silent. Then, every once in a while it would let out what sounded like an alarm. I am letting it sit unplugged all day today, hoping that when I get home I might be able to get a couple minutes out of it so I can make a drive image or something.

 

[redduc900]

From the GetDataBack page I linked you to..

- Important Installation Note -
Do not install GetDataBack on the drive you want to recover! It is strongly recommended to proceed as follows:

Install the program to another computer, which doesn't have any problems. If you have a choice, choose the computer with the most RAM and is the fastest. Attach the drive you want to recover as a slave to this machine. Make sure the drive is jumpered correctly and is recognized by the BIOS.

After downloading GetDataBack run the setup.exe. The setup Wizard will guide you through the installation process.

NEW: If there is no way to attach the drive to an extra computer, you can run GetDataBack from a WinPE boot CD-ROM.

 

[splat]

the drive I'm trying to recover is the secondary drive.

edit: i guess I sould also mention that it is a 4.5gb 5400rpm, udma2 Maxtor Quasar.

 

[tyler_bishop]

Try the freezer trick? Its your last shot!
Wrap in paper towl and INSERT INTO FREEZER!!!

I dont know what else there is left to try other than

FREEZE THAT BABY!

 

[Automata]

i'm still hopefull because the drive does get picked up by the BIOS, it's just a matter of getting access to it in a manner where I can copy the data off. which, even if I can access it, theres no gaurantee that the data will transfer off without getting corrupted by disk errors.

I hope some one can come along with a magical solution for me.

If the BIOS picks it up, doesn't that just mean that the electronics are working on the HDD? I think that physically that drive is messed up and electronically working.

 

[imposter]

Get UBCD or ghost on a disk if you have it. copy the content of the data over. if bios detects the hdd there is a great chance in getting data back

just make sure you use a bigger drive or if you have a same sized drive wipe it and then ghost the drives so you don't copy backwards =P +++KEEP A FAN ON IT

let me know how this goes.

 

[splat]

well, the drive locked up. I am pretty sure it is the bearings that froze because of the "whirring" I was hearing before, and then the loud "ka-chink" i heard before the drive went silent. The drive no longer spins up and is no longer recognized by the bios. I tried the freezer trick, it didn't help at all.

I guess the next step is figuring out how important it is to my sister to get the data off the drive, and seeing how much a data recovery service would charge if it is even possible for them to salvage it.

 

[Automata]

well, the drive locked up. I am pretty sure it is the bearings that froze because of the "whirring" I was hearing before, and then the loud "ka-chink" i heard before the drive went silent. The drive no longer spins up and is no longer recognized by the bios. I tried the freezer trick, it didn't help at all.

I guess the next step is figuring out how important it is to my sister to get the data off the drive, and seeing how much a data recovery service would charge if it is even possible for them to salvage it.

If it just seized up, they should be able to recover it....it won't be cheap, but still doable.

 

[lekyiscool]

yea i have never tried freezer trick i kept myn in cool place then tried again and it would boot i had like 40 mins left with it i left ir running to copy and i got my data back

it sounds like urs is dead tho

 

[TDubbs05]

if the hdd's clicking or making a weird noise it's done. if it sounds fine start the recover w/ getdataback for ntfs.

 

[imposter]

Drive is totally dead. I would recommend to replace the PCB of the hdd, but since its doing that clicky stuff the pcb is probably good.

 

[splat]

I'm pretty certain from the sounds the drive was making that the platters are frozen. Granted, this is the first time I've ever dealt with a dead/dying drive, but it's just one of those gut feelings. I might call up a few of those data recovery companies on monday just to hear what they have to say and get a few quotes.