HD keeps disconnecting and reconnecting, data transfer impos

[dr_orange]

Hello HD data recovery community!
great to find a pleace like this! I'm new to this forum, and being new to this topic, you might wonder what I can contribute to the community? Well, never buy a Lacie HD. I bought one less that six months ago and accidentally pushed it off of my deks and it fell to the floor. It wasn't running, it was off of the power supply, and the fall was less that one meter (tree and a half feet?) but since then, the problems started... Further, Lacie Hard Drives are loud and the model I purchased doesn't have a power switch... Here's an image of my HD from the official website: http://www.lacie.com/products/product.htm?pid=11050
Since the fall, the data doesn't seem to be corrumpt and I didn't experience any dead sectors yet, I can see my data when it's connected to the PC and can even store new data on the HD as well as copy existing data from it to another harddrive. However the issue is that it keeps shutting down and starting up all the time, sometimes once in a minute, sometimes more. But the main problem is that it keeps disconnecting after it shut down, so any file transfer during the shut down of the HD will be unsuccesful since windows doesn't recognise that it's the same HD that it used to be before the disconnection.
So my question is: Is there a tool which enables to transfer the data from my Lacie HD to another HD which recognises that it's the same HD and thus is able to continue the transfer even after the HD disconnected and reconnected again?

Thank you for every reply!

[Nationwide DR]

so let me get this right.... you say don't buy a Lacie because they fall on the floor when you push them off the desk. Silly Lacie, they should have designed them to bounce. It still actually works after the fall? Count yourself lucky. Save the data asap to a new disk. You might have given it some unreadable sectors from the impact or damaged the caddy. Remove it form the caddy, take a clone of the hard drive then copy the data to another hard drive.

Job done.

[dr_orange]

so let me get this right.... you say don't buy a Lacie because they fall on the floor when you push them off the desk. Silly Lacie, they should have designed them to bounce. It still actually works after the fall? Count yourself lucky. Save the data asap to a new disk. You might have given it some unreadable sectors from the impact or damaged the caddy. Remove it form the caddy, take a clone of the hard drive then copy the data to another hard drive.

Job done.

Hi Nationwide DR,
I didn't want to sound arrogant, I'm sorry if it offended somebody. My brother let his external harddrive from Trekstor fall and it still works flawlessily, so I thought that Lacie's harddrives aren't built that well compared to other manufacturers... Thank you for cheering me up that I can count myself happy that it still works
I'm not speaking english natively. What do you mean by 'caddy'? Do you mean the shell around the harddrive itself? And once it's removed, can I still run it externally or do I have to do something else? And how to take a clone of the harddrive? Do you mean an image? Can't I copy the content straight away to another harddrive?

Thank you for your help!

[Nationwide DR]

Hi

Remove the hard drive from the (caddy) casing then fit it as a slave to your computer. Copy your data asap or clone(image) your disk.

If it goes tits up don't blame me.

[rchadwick]

I love how some people think hardware can be fixed with software

If I'm not wrong, LaCie drives are designed by Porsche. You might be better off buying an external enclosure designed by someone who designs external enclosures. You might want to look for an enclosure that shock mounts the drive, and has a cooling fan. The LaCie enclosures I've seen seem to go out of their way to avoid both of these features. But even with shock mounting, dropping a drive is a really bad thing to do. Desktop (3.5") are usually more delicate, as they are designed to be left inside a big bulky computer, not tossed about.

Also, if your data is worth anything to you, store it on a drive you haven't dropped, and doesn't have strange symptoms.

[dr_orange]

I love how some people think hardware can be fixed with software

If I'm not wrong, LaCie drives are designed by Porsche. You might be better off buying an external enclosure designed by someone who designs external enclosures. You might want to look for an enclosure that shock mounts the drive, and has a cooling fan. The LaCie enclosures I've seen seem to go out of their way to avoid both of these features. But even with shock mounting, dropping a drive is a really bad thing to do. Desktop (3.5") are usually more delicate, as they are designed to be left inside a big bulky computer, not tossed about.

Also, if your data is worth anything to you, store it on a drive you haven't dropped, and doesn't have strange symptoms.

Hi rchadwick,
I don't want to fix my hardware with software but finding a tool that recognises that it's the same external harddrive again after it reconnected which it was previously so that it'd be able to continue copying the files to another harddrive...

[dr_orange]

Hi

Remove the hard drive from the (caddy) casing then fit it as a slave to your computer. Copy your data asap or clone(image) your disk.

If it goes tits up don't blame me.

Hi Nationwide DR!
is this a risky procedure? can I put it back in the caddy if it won't work?
is there anything I should keep in mind before I start removing the caddy and connect it as a slave to a desktop PC?

thanks for your help!

[rchadwick]

Forgive me if I was mistaken. I took it that you were trying to return the drive to use somehow.

[dr_orange]

Forgive me if I was mistaken. I took it that you were trying to return the drive to use somehow.

software is mighty, but not almighty

okay, so if nobody replies whether there are things to keep in mind before removing the hard drive from the casing I'll do it and see...

but I'm wondering whether this is the best solution to this problem?
Is there really no such a application which is able to continue a data transfer after the hard drive disconnected and reconnected again?
I assume that the problem comes from the power mechanism in the hard drive itself? If this is the case, removing it from the caddy and connect it to a desktop as slave wouldn't do anything, or would it?

However, thank you for your great support! This is really a great forum with nice people who know much about HD's!

[rchadwick]

It might be a problem with the drive itself, or it might be a problem with the enclosure. I'd put my money on the enclosure, but even if it's only a 20% chance, it would be your best chance. Unlike removing the cover on the actual drive (Which is bad!) removing the drive from the enclosure is easy. You might want to use proper antistatic procedures, and be careful not to scrape the PC board with a screwdriver, and don't drop it while removing it. That's about all that can happen.

I know some imaging software can likely image this drive (In this case, you're making an image of the entire drive, and THEN pick out what files you want. Much safer, unless if you only need a few files), but I don't know if any free software can do this. If you want to spend $400 on imaging software instead of removing the drive from it's enclosure, that's up to you