HDD problem (PC related talk)

[Ravenholm]

I've got a spare Hard Drive that I used to store music on. The 80Gb drive is full to the brim with Metal music. Now I'm not too bothered about most of it as it can more or less all be obtained here and there, be it iTunes or Amazon (Amazon preferably as they are cheaper). My problem is there is a weird clicking type noise coming from the drive. I connect it to the PC and the drive wont show up on screen. I knew I should have backed it all up to DVDs a while back... FUCK!. It's a slow clicking noise kind of similar to a record needle on the record being stuck. Is there anyway in whores-fuck to get things off the drive that I want. You see I really only need 11Gb of stuff. Which is two folders of music.

Folder one: Iron Maiden - Killers World Tour 1981 bootlegs. Which consists of nearly every concert done in 1981 in bootleg form.

Folder two: Iron Maiden - World Slavery Tour 1984/85 bootlegs. Which consists of all the major venues they appeared at. Which is something like 55 bootleg concerts in total.

It is roughly a total of 11Gb I think for both folders. I don't give a flying dog's bollock for anything else on the HDD just those two folders.

 

[EggMcMoofin]

Try the following...

1. Connect the drive to the PC.

2. Go to the hardware and device manager and scan for new devices. If the drive is functional, it will show up in some form under the disk drive tab.

If the drive doesn't show up after that, it's a paperweight. The mechanics inside the drive are damaged so it may not be functional at all.

 

[VampDude]

I get clicking noises from one of my drives...

I just remove it from the caddy/enclosure, shake it and connect it all back together. Which usually works, failing that, I bought myself a cool tool (IOMAX) in December, that can connect all three types of hard drive.

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[Ravenholm]

Thanks guys. I'll give those ideas a go and see what happens.

Wish me luck lol

 

[royrogers]

I had a drive fail and was unable to read it anymore thru the computer. I bought a USB to SATA/IDE adapter, took the drive out, plug it in and was able to get all my information off of it.
The one I have is made by Manhattan, but they're all the same:
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Good to see another dental floss salesman from Montana!

Up the Irons!

 

[Ravenholm]

I had a drive fail and was unable to read it anymore thru the computer. I bought a USB to SATA/IDE adapter, took the drive out, plug it in and was able to get all my information off of it.
The one I have is made by Manhattan, but they're all the same:
Premium Link Upgrade

Good to see another dental floss salesman from Montana!

Up the Irons!

You know that is so weird that. I was thinking of a USB to IDE cable myself half an hour ago. A guy I know has one but the cable is fucked as wires are hanging out of it like it's been cut with something. So that is useless. I will buy one of those soon and give it a go. With any luck that should be all that's needed. I just pray that the Gods of Metal are smiling down on me the day I try it and that it works for me. I've got three options now to work with.

Up the Irons!.

 

[Hondarobot]

I don't think a USB adapter is going to do any good here. The sound you're hearing is the actuator axis having gone ******* and it's now just flipping forward and back across the HDD platter. You could send it to a data recovery service (the data on the platter is probably fine), assuming you think bootleg Iron Maiden concert footage is worth the expense involved in doing this.

There's also the old trick/urban legend of putting the drive in the freezer for awhile. You'd have to seal it in an air tight bag first, and you'd probably only get one more boot session out of it, but it supposedly has worked for some people. I'm not recommending doing this, just mentioning it as an option.

Btw. . .

If you do try the freezer trick, post back with results. I personally don't know anyone who has tried that method.

 

[Ravenholm]

I don't think a USB adapter is going to do any good here. The sound you're hearing is the actuator axis having gone ******* and it's now just flipping forward and back across the HDD platter. You could send it to a data recovery service (the data on the platter is probably fine), assuming you think bootleg Iron Maiden concert footage is worth the expense involved in doing this.

There's also the old trick/urban legend of putting the drive in the freezer for awhile. You'd have to seal it in an air tight bag first, and you'd probably only get one more boot session out of it, but it supposedly has worked for some people. I'm not recommending doing this, just mentioning it as an option.

Btw. . .

If you do try the freezer trick, post back with results. I personally don't know anyone who has tried that method.

It's not concert footage my friend. It's like bootleg MP3 albums of each concert. Yeah the sound on some of them aint that great. But then again it's like Steve Harris once said "these sort of bootlegs are usually only appealing to the die hard fans out there" and I've been eating and ******** Heavy Metal for the past 21 years and counting. I don't listen to anything else. So yes I would do it just for those particular files. But I am not sure in a way about sending off my HDD since it's full of music and with those files being bootlegs of old concerts (that have never in their lives been made available officially). I am not sure about the freezer thing though. If it worked I'd just copy as much as I could on one go from that drive to the working one and just put it all on disc from the working drive. But it sounds a bit dodgy sticking a drive in the freezer lol.

 

[Hondarobot]

Short answer: You're going to have to resort to using a professional data recovery service.

The platters are probably still fine, but the drive mechanics can't read them. You can't open up the HDD case and fix the problem yourself because that requires a Cleanroom, and that's just the first of several requirements.

You could honestly just try hitting the drive a few times and hope for one last boot, it wont hurt the data. Probably isn't going to work, but you could give it a shot. That has not only worked for me several times, it was proven as a valuable method on the Millennium Falcon.