Colleagues,
It's a lost cause and is a loss of time to discuss such arguments. Don Quixote is a rather old book and I think should be read only once in a lifetime.
In Italy we use a term to qualify boring, annoying and obnoxious arguments, discussions, movies... :
PALLOSO.
It is an adjective that can not easily translated, but in a few words means "related to balls" - where "balls" doesn't mean bowling or golf or even football bowls but the smaller and externally attached to male body. A "pallosa" discussion seems to produce aching in that region, i.e. a neverending boring movie, a barely understandable lesson at school, etc. etc. (note that even women , that are not usually supplied with the "accessories" above mentioned, use that term. It really fits the situation).
Jokes apart, I cannot find a different word to catalogate this kind of discussions : on one side the pros that have their sacred reasons , on the other side of the barricade the people that whine for their porn and warez and pics and blah blah blah (and why didn't you buy a spindle of f....ing DVDs to burn that irreplaceable data, then ?) and how greedy are the HDD manufacturers and how bastard are the pros who don't have mercy or compassion... and now put on the cauldron the diagnostics manufactures, too...
Each part does not move a MICRON from his position, so it's totally waste of keyboard typing time, Internet bandwidth, server CPU usage, electricity (= CO2, greenhouse effect)...
Mike, if you have so much time to devote to the cause, do some intelligent research on your own, collect everything and organize it, open a thread (maybe elsewhere where the concentration of pros vs. noobs is not so high so you can eventually expect something different) and ask to make it sticky, instead of asking a solution officilally to be "broadcast" to all the people in difficulties, but - I have this STRONG feeling - to solve an "urgent" problem that at present exist IN YOUR HDD and you want fixed.
If you need, there are a lot of reputable pros in your area that can solve your problem, just ask and if possible you can be addressed to them.
As you were searching for some specific Q&A, now sum up what you found, and then build up your interface, if you will be lucky you'll solve your problem , if not you have lost, and it's not the end of the world (your data, your choice).
Be happy with the info you can find, if you want some more you can always buy it. It's the economy, and you cannot do anything about it.
P.S. next time I will explain another sentence, very hilarious, we use in Italy. For FREE. Stay tuned...