Crying a driver / please Help!

[Digital Paul]

My 2-month old Western Digital WD2500 Serial ATA

hard drive stopped working and I lost all my digital family

pictures (from the last seven years).



WD people will replace the HD under warranty, but only if I don’t

open it or if I choose one of their service partners

for a data recovery service. I just found but they charge

no less than $1000 just to recover the 30 gig folder where my

pictures were stored, so it is a no win situation for me.



I’m running Windows XP Professional in a Pentium-4 PC, and

the damaged driver was working as a NTFS file system “slave”.



Last Saturday I was adding some more pictures to it, and

suddenly without making any noise nor previous problem

at all, the driver froze and stopped working. After several attempts

restarting windows, trying different computers, etc. Windows “saw”

the driver for one last time. I saw my precious pictures folder there, but

I couldn’t retrieve a single file, as after a couple of

minutes the driver stopped working for good.

All attempts that followed were not successful.



My dilemma is that if I open the drive with the hope that

I can free the disk to make it rotate once again just to retrieve

the picture folder, then Western Digital will void

the warranty. This won’t matter if I succeed

recovering my pictures, but if not?



My questions are:



Do I have a chance to make the drive spin, at least

for a while if I remove the cover?



Does anyone know if there is a less expensive service

to retrieve my data, even if doing so I loose the

WD warranty?



I have found some software designed to retrieve lost data

from damaged drives, like HDD Regenerator, but I can’t

try anything because my PC does not even boot when the drive

is connected.



I’ll appreciate any help regarding this matter.



Thanks in advance.

Paul

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

My 2-month old Western Digital WD2500 Serial ATA

hard drive stopped working and I lost all my digital family

pictures (from the last seven years).



WD people will replace the HD under warranty, but only if I don't

open it or if I choose one of their service partners

for a data recovery service. I just found but they charge

no less than $1000 just to recover the 30 gig folder where my

pictures were stored, so it is a no win situation for me.



I'm running Windows XP Professional in a Pentium-4 PC, and

the damaged driver was working as a NTFS file system "slave".



Last Saturday I was adding some more pictures to it, and

suddenly without making any noise nor previous problem

at all, the driver froze and stopped working. After several attempts

restarting windows, trying different computers, etc. Windows "saw"

the driver for one last time. I saw my precious pictures folder there, but

I couldn't retrieve a single file, as after a couple of

minutes the driver stopped working for good.

All attempts that followed were not successful.



My dilemma is that if I open the drive with the hope that

I can free the disk to make it rotate once again just to retrieve

the picture folder, then Western Digital will void

the warranty. This won't matter if I succeed

recovering my pictures, but if not?



My questions are:



Do I have a chance to make the drive spin, at least

for a while if I remove the cover?



Does anyone know if there is a less expensive service

to retrieve my data, even if doing so I loose the

WD warranty?



I have found some software designed to retrieve lost data

from damaged drives, like HDD Regenerator, but I can't

try anything because my PC does not even boot when the drive

is connected.



I'll appreciate any help regarding this matter.



Thanks in advance.

Paul

Your drive is in such a bad condition that your only chance for
data recovery is with the manufacturer. You can, of course,
open the drive and give it a nudge so that it spins, but this is
unlikely to help you. The problem might lie with the electronics
or with the mechanism that moves the read arm.

You may have to consider the fee of $1000.00 as a sharp
reminder that all important data must be backed up to an
independent medium on a weekly basis. An 80 GByte hard
disk, complete with cradle, would have cost you less than
$100.00.

 

[StringFellow Hawk]

Sure, you could go ahead an open it and void the warranty, but think about
this - a hard drive is vacuum sealed in a complete dust free environment.
If you managed to nudge the drive motor and get the platters to spin, all
the dust in the air (from you opening it) would contaminate the drive
platter surfaces and surely crash the heads upon start up - causing even
more loss of data - that's providing what Pegasus said is the problem - the
drive electronics are bad and not causing the problem. And to reiterate,
backup media is cheap, I have automated incremental backups to my external
USB drives on a daily basis, with a full backup done weekly.

 

[Thomas Wendell]

I have read somewhere on these newsgroups (or in alt.comp.hardware...), that
if the HD doesn't spin up due to a "stuck" spindle or bearing, you could try
putting it in a freezer for a couple of hours (wrapped moisture thight). It
MIGHT spin up for some minutes after that..


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Tumppi
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[JEM]

That works!!!!
I did that to a drive 60 GB that failed; it had 40 GB of videos. Got it
running long enough to recover 20 GB, froze it again, and got the other 20.

What ever you do, don't open the drive, there's nothing a layman can service
in there. Not only that, the drive might be fine! The circuit board on the
bottom of the drive may be shot and just need replacing.

Last year, my computer fell victim to a huge power surge - toasted all the
stuff inside - MB, CD Rom, video card, etc...

I had two drives in the system. I pulled them out and stuck them in another
computer. They would spin up, but I could not access the drives. I pulled
the circuit board off and sure enough, parts of them were melted. I had one
spare drive identical to one of the damaged drives, swapped the boards and
retrieved the data. The other one, unfortunately, had to go to a data
recovery center.(I used Iomega, and I highly recommend them.) It cost $
800.00 to get the data back - 25 GB of stuff. They transferred the contents
to an external drive and returned everything. After I received the data and
the damaged drive, I returned it for replacement.

So, what can you do?

1. Try to freeze the drive - see if that works.
2. Buy an identical drive and swap the circuit boards - see if that works -
you can do that without voiding the warranty, I think. You may need a
special 'star' type screwdriver depending on how the circuit board is
attached.
3. Shop around for the best price for recovery. (Iomega was the cheapest,
and again, great service. Not to mention a discount on the drive I bought to
recover the data.
4. After you get your data and drive back, send the drive back for repair
replacement.
5. Back up all your important files on CD or DVD.

 

[Digital Paul]

Many thanks to Pegasus,StringFellow, Thomas Wendell,
JEM, and to all for your help.

I have tried everything you suggested me, but the %#$#%$*
WD does not work. The only option left is what Ed Wurster
recommended, to find someone local who can apply non-destructive
techniques before sending the drive to WD, thanks ED.

After going through all the data I have backed up to several CD-Rs
during the last years, I have recovered several of the files
the bad WD lost, and I believe the only files still missing
are RAW pictures I shot with my new Nikon D70. At this
point I have to decide if to start spending over $1000 just to
get back these RAW pictures, or perhaps
better use the money to buy a ticket to the French Polynesia
just to shoot the pictures again.. What do you think? ; )

Many of you assumed that I have never made back ups but in
fact I regularly do; but after the WD failure I went to check for the
backed up pictures on my second computer and there were just some
folders and most of the files have disappeared.
I cannot explain that. Fortunately there were older backups on CD-R

Although it's not normal for a brand new, well-known
hard disk to die after just 2 months of regular use,
I have learnt my lesson well and from now on I'm going to back up
to different media and redundant devices.

Once again, many thanks to you all for your valuable help.

Regards,
Paul.

 

[Thomas Wendell]

--
Tumppi
Reply to group
=================================================
Most learned on nntp://news.mircosoft.com
Helsinki, Finland (remove _NOSPAM)
(translations from FI/SE not always accurate)
=================================================

Many thanks to Pegasus,StringFellow, Thomas Wendell,
JEM, and to all for your help.

After going through all the data I have backed up to several CD-Rs
during the last years, I have recovered several of the files
the bad WD lost, and I believe the only files still missing
are RAW pictures I shot with my new Nikon D70. At this
point I have to decide if to start spending over $1000 just to
get back these RAW pictures, or perhaps
better use the money to buy a ticket to the French Polynesia
just to shoot the pictures again.. What do you think? ; )

<snip>

I'd go on that trip. Could always use a little vacation....