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Data recovery and disk repair questions and discussions related to old-fashioned SATA, SAS, SCSI, IDE, MFM hard drives - any type of storage device that has moving parts
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Failing hard drive too many bad sectors

April 30th, 2014, 22:08

My Goal: to retrieve as much data on my hard drive as possible.

My computer (labtop HP Pavilian Dv5) circa 2010.
Hard Drive: WD Scorpio Blue
Model: WD5000BEVT
S/N: WXH1A70Y5986
P/N: 591191-001

The computer could not turn on. I immediately tried to back up my data (stupidly I had not) The computer got stuck at 1%
I tried to boot in safe mode, restore point, and every other way No luck. Windows loading file kept getting stuck on the same drive.
I hit F2 or F10 maybe F12 on start up and was apple to check the hard drive, but got an error Hard Disk 1 Quick (303) - Hard disk failing
Then other hard disk test: SMART check passed, short DST: FAILED - got a failure ID and Product ID Hard Disk 1

Then I removed the hard disk and used an adapter so I could use the Hard Drive as a external hard drive.

Driver software could not be installed.

Using the hard drive info downloaded from WD (the hard drive manufacturer) Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows

http://support.wd.com/product/download. ... =3&lang=en

I ran a quick test - SMART test and it passed
Ran extended test and: Too many bad sectors detected

I know there is software like drescue and such, were can can skip the bad sectors or fill the bad sectors, so it can concentrate on recovering the good sectors as quickly as possible. I know now I should also duplicate the drive before doing any of this.

I don't know how to do either of the last 2 things I said or if I should.

Like I said I want to recover any data I possibly can. Please HELP

I have taken some pictures along the way.

Re: Failing hard drive too many bad sectors

May 1st, 2014, 17:55

If your data is critical and can't be replaced then please, I emplore you, stop messing around with the drive. There are no software utilities that can repair a drive that is failing like that, and any efforts will only make it harder to recover later.

If you're data isn't life and death critical you can try ddrescue. It's good for drives with a fair number of bad sectors, however very likely that model will need a slow responding firmware fix or it'll take virtually forever to complete.

More than likely you'll need to have it imaged by someone who has a hardware imaging tool such as PC-3000 w/ Data Extractor, or DeepSpar Disk Imager. These tools both cost thousands, so generally not worth buying yourself, but any data recovery lab should have them.

I generally charge about $500-650 in my lab here in Providence, RI for that kind of case. But given your description of what's happening, I can probably swing it for $450. Let me know if you're interested or visit my site http://www.data-medics.com. I don't do free pickup up there in Boston, but I do go as far as Attleboro. The only other lab I know closer to your area is Excalibur Data Recovery: http://www.excaliburdatarecovery.com/ But just to warn you, their prices are much higher than mine.
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