Saving a Hard Drive?

[h0llywood]

Anyone with experience? I have an old portable that pooped on me maybe 4-5 years ago and was tickling the idea of trying to get it restored to get the contents out of it. Anyone with experience? I know it can be expensive if done professionally but wondering if anyone has any tips? I have letters, emails, photos and videos that I would love to have back and it would help save some of my memories from 10 years ago.

[Jase]

This happened to me at the end of last year. It depends on how the hard drive failed. You might be able to put the HD in the freezer for a few hours to make it operational long enough to get your stuff off of it. If that doesn't work, send it to the lab.

i had to send mine to seagate, and had to pay a king's ransom ($550 total) to get back all of the videos I took of my kids when they were babies. Would do it again if I had to. But now I back up everything to a NAS, paranoid that it'll happen again.

[h0llywood]

26 minutes ago, Jase said:

This happened to me at the end of last year. It depends on how the hard drive failed. You might be able to put the HD in the freezer for a few hours to make it operational long enough to get your stuff off of it. If that doesn't work, send it to the lab.

i had to send mine to seagate, and had to pay a king's ransom ($550 total) to get back all of the videos I took of my kids when they were babies. Would do it again if I had to. But now I back up everything to a NAS, paranoid that it'll happen again.

My concern is i have some stuff on there i'm afraid i shouldn't have and I don't trust a third party with it.... I would hate to find out what i have is illegal (military videos/photos)

[h0llywood]

27 minutes ago, Jase said:

This happened to me at the end of last year. It depends on how the hard drive failed. You might be able to put the HD in the freezer for a few hours to make it operational long enough to get your stuff off of it. If that doesn't work, send it to the lab.

i had to send mine to seagate, and had to pay a king's ransom ($550 total) to get back all of the videos I took of my kids when they were babies. Would do it again if I had to. But now I back up everything to a NAS, paranoid that it'll happen again.

and what does putting in the freezer do? 

[Jase]

7 minutes ago, h0llywood said:

and what does putting in the freezer do? 

If the hard drive isn't working because the platters are warped, the cold shrinks the platters enough so they don't rub together when they spin. It's worked for me before on HDs that make a lot of noise before going kaput.

[h0llywood]

5 minutes ago, Jase said:

If the hard drive isn't working because the platters are warped, the cold shrinks the platters enough so they don't rub together when they spin. It's worked for me before on HDs that make a lot of noise before going kaput.

Ok great i'll give it a try.

[Jase]

4 minutes ago, h0llywood said:

Ok great i'll give it a try.

Put it in a ziploc Baggie before freezing

[h0llywood]

2 hours ago, Jase said:

Put it in a ziploc Baggie before freezing

Ok good thing you wrote that, I was about to put it in raw.

How long do you put it in?

[KSpan]

1 hour ago, h0llywood said:

Ok good thing you wrote that, I was about to put it in raw.

How long do you put it in?

[chknwing]

alot of times in portables the hard drive is fine, its the enclosure/board thats fuged up, take it out pop it in a pc see if it works.  lol dont format.  if the the thing was clicking, its dead jim.  Its incredibly expensive to try and retrieve that data and most likely that broken head on the hard drive, why its clicking, has already scratched the discs and caused irreversible damage.

[NanuqoftheNorth]

5 hours ago, Jase said:

If the hard drive isn't working because the platters are warped, the cold shrinks the platters enough so they don't rub together when they spin. It's worked for me before on HDs that make a lot of noise before going kaput.

 

[h0llywood]

14 hours ago, chknwing said:

alot of times in portables the hard drive is fine, its the enclosure/board thats fuged up, take it out pop it in a pc see if it works.  lol dont format.  if the the thing was clicking, its dead jim.  Its incredibly expensive to try and retrieve that data and most likely that broken head on the hard drive, why its clicking, has already scratched the discs and caused irreversible damage.

Sometimes when I plug it in i hear it spinning but no connection shows up. Not sure if that matters?

[Davidson Deac II]

If you are really worried about what is on it, submerge it in water for a week or so, let it sit for a while, then rip it apart or smash it with a hammer.  While its still possible in theory to recover what is on it, I can't imagine anyone would go to that much trouble.  Unless you are secretly James Bond.  :)

 

You could also shoot it with a Shotgun, which might be fun.   Just wear some safety gear if you shoot it at close range. 

[h0llywood]

3 hours ago, Davidson Deac II said:

If you are really worried about what is on it, submerge it in water for a week or so, let it sit for a while, then rip it apart or smash it with a hammer.  While its still possible in theory to recover what is on it, I can't imagine anyone would go to that much trouble.  Unless you are secretly James Bond.  :)

 

You could also shoot it with a Shotgun, which might be fun.   Just wear some safety gear if you shoot it at close range. 

I've thought about this multiple times until I came to the conclusion that my porn collection was worth saving.