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  1. #1
    LucyG is offline Sapphire level (2000+ posts)
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    Default Technology gurus - HELP!

    The hard drive on our home computer died. It "went bad," in the words of the computer repairman. It was apparently a mechanical failure rather than a virus. We are sick. Really, I am physically ill over this. I had recently burned all of our digital pictures to disk, so that is a HUGE relief. However, there is still information on the hard drive that we would very much like to have back, if possible. According to our computer guy, attempting to recover data from a "dead" hard drive is very expensive. I can believe that. Do any of you know just how expensive it is, and what the success rate of doing so is? I am mostly mad at myself for not backing things up better. But, that is neither here nor there now. I have learned a very hard lesson. I just want to know whether it would be worth the time and money to try to get things off the hard drive now. I know there are a lot of IT people on this board. What do you know and suggest? Thanks.

  2. #2
    LucyG is offline Sapphire level (2000+ posts)
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    Default RE: Technology gurus - HELP!

    bump

  3. #3
    mamahill Guest

    Default RE: Technology gurus - HELP!

    We had a hard drive do this a little over a year ago and we had NOT burned pictures to a cd in a while. :( I know how you feel - anytime I thought about it, I really thought I was going to throw up. It contained Ainsleigh's first Halloween/Thanksgiving/Christmas. The other info I cared about, but mostly I just wanted the pictures. I found a place to do the data recovery and I think it came to around $400 ($50 diagnostic whatever, and $350 for the recovery). But they got EVERYTHING back. It was a Mac, and usually those are more expensive, but this place was incredible and VERY economical (at least according to some of the quotes I was hearing).

    Call around - quotes will vary widely. And ask yourself what you ARE willing to pay. I probably would have paid twice that for my pictures. But I've learned my lesson - and that computer now has a new hard drive (we installed it ourselves - they would have done it for another $100 besides the cost of the drive. DH felt comfortable enough with it to do it himself).

    Good luck! Big hugs - I know how devestating this can be. Chin up! :)

  4. #4
    LucyG is offline Sapphire level (2000+ posts)
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    Default RE: Technology gurus - HELP!

    Sarah,

    Thank you SO MUCH!!!!! I feel better, and at least a little hopeful. I am most sad that we lost the 60+ page journal I kept during my pregnancy. I am willing to pay a lot to have that back. I will let you know what happens!

    Lucy

  5. #5
    papal Guest

    Default RE: Technology gurus - HELP!

    ACK!! So sorry that this happened. Can you call around and ask for a second opinion? And if it is still diagnosed as a hard-crash then maybe you could ask several different companies for quotes? I would think that it will be fairly expensive to recover though (by the way, are you dealing with a Mac or PC?). If it is a Mac, were you able to boot using the CD??

    Really, this is one of my big fears too.. i don't back anything up.. you have at least got me motivated to burn an image of my hard-disk onto a disc.

  6. #6
    heidi_timms Guest

    Default Help from my husband

    Hi!

    My husband used to build computer networks for a living. He has gone through this many times. There are services out there that do recovery, but the prices range from several hundred to several thousand dollars.

    There is a way to do it yourself. I had my husband type up instructions, but if your hardrive doesn't spin(Hardware failure), this won't work. If your hardrive is corrupted, then this is how you would recover your data. Here are the instructions he typed up. I am cutting and pasting:

    ************************************************** ****************
    There is a way that you can do it yourself. You will need another computer or if your computer is running on another hard drive you can use that. You will have to set the jumpers on your hard drive to slave. The jumpers are the little black piece of plastic at the end of your hard drive. You would have to remove the plastic pin and on the hard drive you will see a diagram that shows you Master, Slave and CS (cable select). You need to position the jumpers (black plastic pin) to look like the slave diagram. After you have successfully completed that you need to shut off your computer, unplug it from the wall, open it up and install the hard drive. You will be using the empty connector on the same cable that the other hard drive is plugged into. Now plug in the power to the hard drive, put the case back together, plug in the computer and turn on the computer. Go to my computer and see if you can see the hard drive. If you see the hard drive, open it up and see if you can see the data. If you can see your data, stop here….you are done.
    If you can see the hard drive but there is no data in it, you can still recover the lost data. Go to www.r-studio.com and download the demo version. After you install it run it and see if it finds you data. If it finds your data you will have to purchase the software for $49.95 but you will need to know what format your file system is in. You can find this out by going to my computer and right clicking on the drive and choose properties. Under the general tab you will see, Label: Type: Local Disk and File System: NTFS or FAT. It is the NTFS or FAT that you need to know. These are the two types of file systems. Choose the right type, buy the software and recover your data.

    I know this sounds complicated but it really isn’t. I hope this helps you.
    ************************************************** *****************

    PM me if you need more help. I would be happy to give you my husband's email address for additional help/advice.

    ~Heidi
    Mom to Kailey Ashlin
    4/27/03

  7. #7
    LucyG is offline Sapphire level (2000+ posts)
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    Default RE: Help from my husband

    Heidi,

    Thank you so much! The computer is going in for a second opinion today. I don't know whether or not the hard drive is spinning, but hopefully it is, and can be recovered. I printed out your husband's instructions. Please thank him for me! We only have one computer, so don't want to attempt to fix this at home. Hopefully the news will be good. If not, at least we did find part of the pregnancy journal on disk, including DD's birthstory that I had written. I am feeling a little better about things now, because of that.

    Thanks!

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