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#1
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
Does anyone know of freeware which can diagnose & recognize an already
crashed hard disk on an IBM laptop? My kid's IBM laptop hard disk "stopped working" (it had been making noise, he said). - The IBM laptop would not boot no matter what I tried - I put the laptop hard disk in a different working laptop - same thing - In a 2nd IBM laptop as a 2nd disk - it still wasn't recognized. (Even though it was a second disk in a second bay, the good laptop would not boot, saying "Operating System not found" even though it was clearly the second disk.) I figured I'd see if I could be a hero and save his lost photos and email. After googling, I bought a Vantec "SATA/IDE to USB 2.0 Adapter" and connected the crashed laptop IDE hard disk to the USB port of a second (good) laptop. The hard disk would not be seen, even when I used the WinXP "Disk Management" utility found by right-clicking on My Computer. (A second hard disk worked fine so I know the Vantec IDE-to-USB adapter was working.) After googling some more, and with the laptop 2.5" IDE hard disk externally tied to the USB port of a good computer, I tried using the TestDisk & PhotoRec 6.9-WIP, Data Recovery freeware (from http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Download) - but "TestDisk" also did not see the hard disk attached to the USB port via the Vantec adapter. Googling some more, I downloaded PCWorld's "Recover Data for Fat & NTFS" shareware at "http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file/fid,66229-order,1-page,1/description.html At least this program recognized the good disk (disk 0) and the bad disk attached to the Vantec IDE-to-USB adapter (disk 1) - but PCWorld's program said the crashed hard disk was zero size: - Physical Disk Number: 1 - Model: USB Device - Media Type: Fixed hard disk media - Cylinder: 0 - Head: 0 - Sectors Per Track: 0 - Disk Size: 0MB And, when I tried to recover data, PCWorld's Recover Data program said "Encountered Bad Sector(s) while reading disk." Digging further, I found PC Magazine recommended PC Inspector (http://pcmag.ph/hard-disk/recovering...rd-disk-crash/) for freeware hard disk recovery after crashes. I even put the hard drive in a zip-lock bag in the freezer (based on google results) but nothing changed when I repeated the tests. QUESTION: What hard-drive crash-recovery WinXP freeware do you recommend which will diagnose a hard drive and perhaps recover some of the lost files? |
#2
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
"Erica Eshoo" wrote:
Does anyone know of freeware which can diagnose & recognize an already crashed hard disk on an IBM laptop? very long post snipped QUESTION: What hard-drive crash-recovery WinXP freeware do you recommend which will diagnose a hard drive and perhaps recover some of the lost files? You may be able to download a diagnostic program specific to the brand of hard drive (from the manufacturer's website), or you could try one of the hard disk diagnostic tools on the Ultimate Boot CD: http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/index.html However, as your drive isn't being recognised and read then it could be that freeware or paid for diagnostic software will not help in the circumstances. I hope I am wrong and that someone else can give you some hope. I suspect that you might be looking at using a commercial data recovery service. If the fault is on the hard drive circuit board, and you can replace it with a working board for that drive, then that might give you access to the data. But if the fault is inside the drive then I suspect that the situation is hopeless. I am not an expert in data recovery or anything else. |
#3
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
Erica Eshoo wrote:
[SNIP Disk recovery attempts...] Nothing may work, but before the next try, put the disk inside a plastic bag, seal it, and put it in the freezer for an hour or two, then *very* quickly try to recover the data. Cheers, Gary B-) -- __________________________________________________ ____________________________ Armful of chairs: Something some people would not know whether you were up them with or not - Barry Humphries |
#4
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
Gary R. Schmidt wrote:
Erica Eshoo wrote: [SNIP Disk recovery attempts...] Nothing may work, but before the next try, put the disk inside a plastic bag, seal it, and put it in the freezer for an hour or two, then *very* quickly try to recover the data. Cheers, Gary B-) Did you not read the second to last sentence of the original post? John. |
#5
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
Hi,
I think you will find that most, if not all software only recovery programs, will require the operating system to detect your drive as a physical drive. I know this is the way I have written CnW Recovery. Once software get get a handle on the drive, it can access sectors, or attempt to access sectors, and then recover logical data. If it cannot see the drive, then it cannot start. There are also limitations when using a USB caddy, for instance it is not possible to access S.M.A.R.T data using USB. With specialised hardware and software, it is possible to diagnose the problem further. The suggestion of getting a replacement controller board is very unlikely to help as all boards store details of the drive defects etc that would need to be copied, recreated. A specialist company is probably the only way forward. In the furture, backups should be investigated!! Michael www.cnwrecovery.com |
#6
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
John wrote:
Gary R. Schmidt wrote: Erica Eshoo wrote: [SNIP Disk recovery attempts...] Nothing may work, but before the next try, put the disk inside a plastic bag, seal it, and put it in the freezer for an hour or two, then *very* quickly try to recover the data. Cheers, Gary B-) Did you not read the second to last sentence of the original post? No - evidently not, I must have missed it. Cheers, Gary B-) -- __________________________________________________ ____________________________ Armful of chairs: Something some people would not know whether you were up them with or not - Barry Humphries |
#7
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
On Sat, 03 Nov 2007 22:20:28 +1100, Gary R. Schmidt wrote:
Did you not read the second to last sentence of the original post? No - evidently not, I must have missed it. How does that work anyway? What does a "cold hard disk" do differently than a warm one? |
#8
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Erica Eshoo wrote:
On Sat, 03 Nov 2007 22:20:28 +1100, Gary R. Schmidt wrote: Did you not read the second to last sentence of the original post? No - evidently not, I must have missed it. How does that work anyway? What does a "cold hard disk" do differently than a warm one? Very simple: It skews a lot of operating parameters. If the drive just barely not manages to work, this can make it work temporarily. It is a long shot though. Arno |
#9
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Erica Eshoo wrote:
Does anyone know of freeware which can diagnose & recognize an already crashed hard disk on an IBM laptop? My kid's IBM laptop hard disk "stopped working" (it had been making noise, he said). - The IBM laptop would not boot no matter what I tried - I put the laptop hard disk in a different working laptop - same thing - In a 2nd IBM laptop as a 2nd disk - it still wasn't recognized. (Even though it was a second disk in a second bay, the good laptop would not boot, saying "Operating System not found" even though it was clearly the second disk.) I figured I'd see if I could be a hero and save his lost photos and email. After googling, I bought a Vantec "SATA/IDE to USB 2.0 Adapter" and connected the crashed laptop IDE hard disk to the USB port of a second (good) laptop. The hard disk would not be seen, even when I used the WinXP "Disk Management" utility found by right-clicking on My Computer. (A second hard disk worked fine so I know the Vantec IDE-to-USB adapter was working.) After googling some more, and with the laptop 2.5" IDE hard disk externally tied to the USB port of a good computer, I tried using the TestDisk & PhotoRec 6.9-WIP, Data Recovery freeware (from http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Download) - but "TestDisk" also did not see the hard disk attached to the USB port via the Vantec adapter. Googling some more, I downloaded PCWorld's "Recover Data for Fat & NTFS" shareware at "http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file/fid,66229-order,1-page,1/description.html At least this program recognized the good disk (disk 0) and the bad disk attached to the Vantec IDE-to-USB adapter (disk 1) - but PCWorld's program said the crashed hard disk was zero size: - Physical Disk Number: 1 - Model: USB Device - Media Type: Fixed hard disk media - Cylinder: 0 - Head: 0 - Sectors Per Track: 0 - Disk Size: 0MB And, when I tried to recover data, PCWorld's Recover Data program said "Encountered Bad Sector(s) while reading disk." Digging further, I found PC Magazine recommended PC Inspector (http://pcmag.ph/hard-disk/recovering...rd-disk-crash/) for freeware hard disk recovery after crashes. I even put the hard drive in a zip-lock bag in the freezer (based on google results) but nothing changed when I repeated the tests. QUESTION: What hard-drive crash-recovery WinXP freeware do you recommend which will diagnose a hard drive and perhaps recover some of the lost files? I think your chances are very slim and that physical repair is needed to recover the data. Time to teach your kid about backup. The lession that HDDs can fail should already have been sucessful. Arno |
#10
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How to recover a crashed laptop hard disk (windows NTFS)
On 3 Nov 2007 16:24:53 GMT, Arno Wagner wrote:
Time to teach your kid about backup. The lession that HDDs can fail should already have been sucessful. Indeed. He's crying over the loss of his data. I'm trying to be syphathetic but personally, from an adult standpoint, I'm not too worried about it. But, it would be nice to recover it so I'll keep trying for a while. Since cold operating parameters didn't work, I might try putting the hard disk in a zip-lock bag and heating it, either via the microwave or the oven or boiling it in the water-tight baggie. Actually, microwave might be too dangerous as it's metal on the outside so I'll skip that - but I'll try heating it to change the operating parameters in the other direction. Does anyone know the maximum heat a hard disk can take in the oven. I'm thinking about 212 degrees (pot) or perhaps 250 (oven). Can a hard disk take 250 degrees? More importantly, do you think hot works in addition to cold? |
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