Fixing Dead Harddrive

[c_hernandez32]

Recently my harddrive died and probably took with it countless and priceless family photos. Most of them were backed up, but my wife had just scanned a few rare photos that she had to borrow from family members. We might get them back to scan again, but the hassle of having to repair them again makes my wife cringe.

I want to see if there are any places that will clone HDs for a low price (under $500 if possible). A quick Google found alot of choices, but one that I called said that it would be about $100 to diagnose and $500 to $2500 to copy. Is this the norm? I don't want to rebuilt again. The drive is a 80GB Seagate. It is only 3 years old.

If any one has had success in recovering important files, please let me know.

[guns1inger]

The chances of getting it going again are slim, and if you did you would do so only inorder to save important files. Then you would throw it away.

As to the norm, yes, for reputable data recovery, they are pretty normal prices. This could include removing your platters and putting them in a new casing in order to recover.

I can suggest a few things you can try in order to get your data back, but if they fail you will never recover from it. I'd start with the pros, then come back here if you get really desperate.

[rallynavvie]

Have you tried the freezer trick? Throw the HDD in the freezer overnight and then take it out and plug it in. Start it up as soon as you can and then quickly try to transfer everything off of it before it dies again. I was able to finally try this trick at work a few weeks ago and it seemed to work okay. In fact the hard drive kept going for several more hours (I left it in just to see how long it would keep going). May or may not work, but then it may be worth a try. I can't see those expensive recovery options getting any more expensive because you tried this

Oh and remember to plug it in before booting, not afterward

[Shard92]

Have you tried the freezer trick? Throw the HDD in the freezer overnight and then take it out and plug it in. Start it up as soon as you can and then quickly try to transfer everything off of it before it dies again. I was able to finally try this trick at work a few weeks ago and it seemed to work okay. In fact the hard drive kept going for several more hours (I left it in just to see how long it would keep going). May or may not work, but then it may be worth a try. I can't see those expensive recovery options getting any more expensive because you tried this

Oh and remember to plug it in before booting, not afterward

Maybe maybe not.... depends on the actual problem with the drive. It does take the risk that you will loose the file completely. you take this risk any time you turn on a damaged/dying drive. And yes those prices are typical. It depends ( usually ) on how much data is recovered and the extend of the labor involved to get it back.

[thevoelk]

If it's not making a grinding noise, you may be in luck. See if you can find the exact same model hard drive. If the contents of the drive are that important, it would even be worth buying it. Take the controller off of the new drive and off of the old drive. Use the new controller and attach it to the old drive. You may be lucky and it was just the controller that died. You can probably get away with using a controller from a similar model also.

Your profile doesn't say the bran of the drive, but if you have a WD Caviar 60GB you may find that the controller is the same as the one on the 80GB WD Caviar, etc. They may all be same for the Caviar line, I'm not sure. What I am sure of is that I've done this plenty of times, and it works quite well if you do it right. If you are going to try this, DO NOT try to use the controller from a WD on a Mxtor, or a Seagate on a Hitachi, etc. You'll make a bad problem worse.

If your drive can't be accessed but still spins up, feel free to PM me. I have several tools at work I'm free to use after hours on my personal equipment that work quite well.