Extracting data from a failed hdd

[Django]

Hello everyone......I have a question on extracting data from a failed IDE hdd. How does one do this??........is it something that an average pc user can do or is it strictly a pro job??. Can somebody give me a run down on the process on how to do such a task?? Thanks in advance.

[Reloadron]

Originally Posted by Django

Hello everyone......I have a question on extracting data from a failed IDE hdd. How does one do this??........is it something that an average pc user can do or is it strictly a pro job??. Can somebody give me a run down on the process on how to do such a task?? Thanks in advance.

The ability to recover the data on a failed HDD is sort of proportional to the type of failure. Many HDDs (but not all) fail because of mechanical failure. The tiny bearings may sieze and the drive simply won't spin up. When this happens, some users have had luck removing the drive and using the "Freezer Trick". This involves removing the drive and placing it in a well sealed bag (Zip Lock) and placing it in a cold freezer for several hours. Then quickly remove the drive and install it, frequently skipping the screws. With luck the drive may spin up. Should this work, get what you can while you can as it may not work again.

If the head crashed into the atual platten(s) and scratched them, data recovery is just about (likely) impossible.

Sometimes the Logic Board on the drive fails. This is an electronic failure in nature and people have had sucess removing and replacing the board with a matching like board, that includes the same firmware revision/version.

Before worrying about data recovery it is important to know exactly how the drive failed? Symptoms? Making sure the PATA cable is known good and there is good power to the drive.

The ability to recover data at the user level is really a matter of the user's skill level.

Last but not least has the drive manufacturer's utilities been run on the drive? Most manufacturers provide diagnostic (bootable) to look the drive over for problems. Has that been tried?

Ron

[Django]

Thanks for the reply Ron..........well I will pass on the info to my friend, he is the one that has the hdd failure and needs to get the data off asap. Gonna try to get more info as to what exactly happened to his machine. Thanks again.

[Jayronn]

Hello everyone......I have a question on extracting data from a failed IDE hdd. How does one do this??........is it something that an average pc user can do or is it strictly a pro job??. Can somebody give me a run down on the process on how to do such a task?? Thanks in advance.

First you should understand that hard drive failure is of two types Logical failure and physical failure. Logical failure occurs when the data on the hard drive get accidentally deleted or lost due to viruses, software malfunction, file/directory deletion or even sabotage. This type of issue can be solved by data recovery software. Stellar Phoenix Windows Data Recovery Software is one such data recovery tools which provides recovery from such situation. It works for both type of file system FAT & NTFS.

Physical failure occurs when the head of the hard drive crashes or electronic board suffered circuit. Recovery from such cases require data recovery service where hard drive is opened in Class 100 Clean Room to replace the failing part.

[Yellowhello]

Welcome Jayronn.

[Tech Geek Deluxe]

Post #2 covers it ... But If your drive spins at all ... Spinrite is a good solution to revive an "almost dead" drive. Then data recovery is a snap.

If it only clicks and does not spin up at all then spinrite cannot help.

[Quakindude]

Even though I can't help you out any more than what you've already been told, we are going to be looking to a couple of companies to see if we can get their software for review here at HardwareLogic. Since I have a failed external RAID drive, it has 4x250GB HDD in it and the controller card is burned up, now would be an excellent time for me to review a software suite.

Hopefully, HL can provide our members with a good choice when it comes to these most unfortunate and upsetting events.

[Tech Geek Deluxe]

Quake:

I stumbled across Spinrite in during a lengthy research into forensic software and was very impressed with it. From what I have researched about spinrite ... and benefited from its use ... it does amazing things to restore an HD.

My only personal experience is with a fairly new Sata Drive that was part of a raid array.

It had one error that would eventually corrupt my array.
Ran spinrite and it fixed the internal mechanical error.

[Reloadron]

The original post was 22 May 2007. Now discussing data recovery is always a good thing, however, bringing back a thread this old just doesn't seem a good way to do it. The topic would likely make for a good article or write up subject as a new thread.

Also as was mentioned:

Jayronn, Welcome to the HL Forums.

Ron