Hard drive Failure

[Guest_imported]

Hi there! I had two hard drives in my PC and I was using one to store all my documents, MP3s, AVIs, MPEGS etc. I have bought it only a year ago or soand had basically moved all my user files to it to make space on my C: drive for more programs. It is a Seagate 40Gb drive. Anyway, it was all working great until a few days ago when I tried to start my computer and it would get to the desktop and freeze. After a couple of seconds, I also started getting a repeating clicking sound which I ascertained to be from my "D" drive. I tried starting up in safe mode and although I got through and in the few seconds that the computer was not frozen, even managed to get into my "D" drive and saw my folders, but it then froze again and started the whole clicking thing.
I have since removed the "D" drive and the PC works fine. ALL and I mean a LOT of files were on the D drive that are very important. Specially, e-mails, documents etc and I desparately want to find a way to salvage them. Any ideas?

 

[braddds]

I have had this happen to me several times before, it sounds like a bad sector on the drive. You have to hook up the D:\ drive first. Then you'll have to run a "scandisk" (or equivalent like norton diskdoctor, or similar) from DOS. You'll have to sit there and watch it as it goes and answer yes to the prompts, or, if you are comfortable with automation, you can have it automatically repair/correct all errors. Just type "scandisk /?" (without quotes) at the DOS prompt to find all the settings.

One thing I'd like to mention is that if in DOS you can see your files then back them up to another drive or medium before attempting any repairs. If you are unable to backup you may experience some data loss. Personally, I've never had a problem, but having said that I've always worked with a safety net (ie: backed-up before proceding).

This procedure usually fixed the problem. Let me, or the others on this site know if you experience any further problems. Other solutions can be tried after if this fails.

Good Luck

Braddds

 

[Guest_imported]

Unfortunately, I've tried all that. Even in DOS mode, I can get as far as to see the folders initially and sometimes even if I go inside one of them but as soon as I try to copy anything, the computer hangs. I've tried with bootup disks, windows, safe mode, changing to secondary slave, primary slave and all that, but no go. It keeps doing the whole clicking thing. I think all my data is there but there is something wrong with the seek heads maybe? Haven't tried scandisk from DOS but when I try to startup, sometimes the good ol blue scandisk screen starts up automatically for Drive D:, but gets stuck at 1% and goes nowhere fast. HEEEEEELLLLLPPP!!!!

 

[braddds]

You are experiencing a hardware problem not software. Windows will only keep doing the same thing no matter what you try including "SafeMode". DOSprompt only, perferably from a bootdisk. Look for dosboot disks, see:

http://dos.li5.org/,

http://www.bootdisk.com

or search for DR DOS. I've even had luck with older versions of dos/scandisk where the newer wasn't able to get past the problem the older one worked - go figure!

You maybe able to get your data off with some utility off the net - something for data recovery. This is now your first priority. All other fixes, that I'm aware of for this type of problem, require the destruction of data to remedy this situation. Sorry I can't tell you what software/freeware as I'm not at home and that is where the info is. But just do a google search for "data recovery freeware"

http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Hardware/Storage/Data_Recovery/

or some other combination. Drive rescue 1.9, GetDataBack are a couple of possibilities. You'll have to do some reading!

What ever you do get your data off and secure, first, before attempting repairs to the drive. I've never knowingly lost data before but some solutions required some investigation, searching and time to fix them. If you don't have the time I'd suggest a data recovery firm, costly but reliable!