HDD Damage

[haydw]

Mrs Haydw had a slight accident this evening- she managed to accidentally tread on the corner of our laptop- just above the HDD.

It now will not boot up and cant find the operating system- there is no visible damage at all and it does make a couple of noises when firing up- question is will there be any way of extracting any of the data on it or am I stuffed?

Have done a backup to a mates spare HDD (hence this post) but that is dated back to last august. Nothing much extra has changed, only I could do with all my emails back.....

Any ideas much appreciated.

 

[Fanum]

There are lots of companies who do data recovery from knackered disks........chances are yours is ok, it's the drive mechanism that sounds like its been shagged.

Google up 'data recovery' and so on, you'll soon find a local(ish) company .

The other way to go is to buy an identical HDD and carefully take it apart, then stick the platter from the knackered one into the one with the good mechanism.......you'll find several articles on t'internet about doing this as well...inc pics and so on.....again Google is your friend


Long and short of it is you can almost certainly get the data back, it depends on how far you're prepared to go and how much it's worth to you

 

[Mav]

There are lots of companies who do data recovery from knackered disks........chances are yours is ok, it's the drive mechanism that sounds like its been shagged.

Google up 'data recovery' and so on, you'll soon find a local(ish) company .

The other way to go is to buy an identical HDD and carefully take it apart, then stick the platter from the knackered one into the one with the good mechanism.......you'll find several articles on t'internet about doing this as well...inc pics and so on.....again Google is your friend


Long and short of it is you can almost certainly get the data back, it depends on how far you're prepared to go and how much it's worth to you

+1 These recovery guys are pretty good - they can often get all your data off and put it on to DVDs. I paid about £100 when it happened to me a year or so ago.

 

[centaur]

Are you sure it's the HDD ? Most of 'em are pretty rugged. Could it be that the RAM has become dislodged, or possibly a connector ?

Try googling your make/model and look for replacing/repairing memory or dismantling/reassembly. I found one for my Tosh this way

 

[haydw]

Definately HDD. Replaced with a spare (tiny one) and rebuilt and it works fine. Now bought a new HDD of a sensible size and am now formatting it and will rebuild it onto this new one.

There isnt a lot of data on the old one, mainly emails and it would be nice to get the info off it without spending mega money.

Oh, and my ipod wont fire up or charge either- totally dead. Used it at the gym on monday and it was fine. Anyone got any ideas for this as well?

 

[Fanum]

Oh, and my ipod wont fire up or charge either- totally dead. Used it at the gym on monday and it was fine. Anyone got any ideas for this as well?

1) Stop going to the Gym...that fitness stuff'll kill you ya know!
2) Buy a decent Mp3 player and don't be a fashion victim

 

[Bigtwin]

Definately HDD. Replaced with a spare (tiny one) and rebuilt and it works fine. Now bought a new HDD of a sensible size and am now formatting it and will rebuild it onto this new one.

There isnt a lot of data on the old one, mainly emails and it would be nice to get the info off it without spending mega money.

Oh, and my ipod wont fire up or charge either- totally dead. Used it at the gym on monday and it was fine. Anyone got any ideas for this as well?

How old? Sounds like the battery is knackered-mine did that at about the 3 year point. £2.99 to a gentleman named Wee in HK via ebay and all was well again - they just clip in and out with a ribon connector - just lever the front and back apart and the rest is a 15 sec job.
Before you try that - just desconnect the battery, leave for 10 mins and try again - my G4 did that once, and it's been fine ever since.

 

[Clive795]

There isnt a lot of data on the old one, mainly emails and it would be nice to get the info off it without spending mega money

I could help but it would mean you getting the HDD to me in Bath.

PM if you want to me to help.

It would help to know what e mail client you are using.

Clive