Hey guys/girls.

3 years ago I dropped my laptop which was running. The screen (windows) froze and it wouldn't re boot, just stayed black when the windows loading screen was supposed to show up. I just took the hard drive out and bought a new replacement, put the "broken" one aside for a rainy day (not too much important stuff was on it, just a lot of pictures that 3 years later I now would like). I'm not super computer savvy but I searched my arse off and this is what I came up with.

1. I bought an IDE - USB adapter so I could interface with the old HD from my new computer (XPS16 with 256GB SSD)
2. Had to determine whether the problem was physical (scratched platter/damaged head/actuator/servo damage..figured this was it since it was dropped) or the control circuit board.
3. Downloaded two different file recovery programs: PC Inspector (free) and Recover My Files v4 (free trial)
4. Upon trying to run ANY programs, when the drive is plugged in, it "freezes" the computer until it is unplugged, and re-plugged in.
5. Drive does not show up in "My Computer", and takes a few connects/disconnects to show up in the recovery programs lists.

I first wanted to rule out connectivity issues, made sure I had the right drivers for the adapter, Windows says the USB device is good to go.

Just as a precaution, I also ran a vista recovery disc and ran BootFix on the disc to see if maybe just the boot section was screwed up, but the bootfix utility itself could not find a drive to fix, even though it was hooked up...leading me to believe the drive couldn't read anything. Still pointing to physical damage.

Ran PC Inspector, would find the hard disk, but wouldn't find any "logical drives" on it no matter how broad I made the search perameters...so I got nothing out of it.

Keep in mind, these programs freeze until I disconnect the drive, then reconnect it to get it to show up on the list of drives to recover.

Ran Recover My Files..this one actually started scanning, but kept stalling at the same point "3024/8304 blocks" no matter how many times I ran it. Now I'm picturing a "ring" created by a head strike and this is the wall the scan is hitting..but I know very little so I could be wrong...

After it stalls, I listened to the drive and can hear it "tracking"...click...click...click...then the head returning to home, then click...click...click...return to home...over and over. (Not to be confused with the loud clicking of a damaged armature stop) Not sure if this is a sign of physical damage like the heads can't find where they belong?

The recovery software DID find 234 jpg files before stalling....but since I have the free trial I can't view them.

So this perplexed me....I was thinking the head hit the platter...but it found 200+ files...so the head SHOULD be ok....so I'm thinking maybe the platter is scratched..but wouldn't that screw up the head at the same time and give me no data output at all?

Anyone think this could still be a non-physical failure from being dropped?

I think I'm going to buy an identical new HD and try swapping the boards first, then if that fails, swapping the old platter into the new HD, maybe the armature/heads on the new one will read the old platter even if it was damaged by the original heads?



Thanks for taking the time to read.

You need to be imaging the drive with a DOS or Linux based imaging s/w,such as Media Tools Pro or dd_rescue.

Then run regular DR s/w on the image.

Do not hammer this failing drive any more than you have to.

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you probably have media scratches or a failing head. Commercial software won't help you for this case.

Thanks for the replies PCimage and HDDspaz.

PCspaz...so in short terms, I should download or buy one of those programs, make a "copy" (mirror) of the whole disc onto another disc, then run the recovery software I have on the copy? I'm not sure that will work since the broken drive keeps getting stuck at that certain point (unless the programs you recommended have the ability to "skip" damaged platter sections...I will try anyways as you probably know what your talking about and I do not

HDD spaz....I'm thinking the same, maybe the drop broke or misaligned the armature just enough to cause read problems...if the above doesn't work I'm going to transfer the old platter into a new case and see what happens...

Thanks again for the help!

You do that and you will fail, all data will be lost. Get a quote from a pro, it might not be that expensive. We have tools designed to deal with drives like this and to keep them out of the clean room. If you continue to play, it will need to go to a clean room then we are talking serious money!

I am having the same exact issue trying to pull off pictures and files from a Seagate Momentus out of an old laptop using an IDE - USB connector. Computer recognizes USB Drive but My Computer won't recognize a drive and after a few minutes it freezes my computer until I disconnect the drive.

Did you ever figure it out? Please let me know, thanks.

TJ

It may caused by many damaged sectors on your hard drive or weak heads. If you can't copy data via Windows or any other OS, and if you need the data back, you might want to send it in for the diagnostic. It sounds like you may be able to get your data back without using the cleanroom. But if you keep powering up the drive, soon it will end up in the cleanroom for the recovery.

When I mentioned "cheap", I didn't mean under a few hundred $$$...

Or worse

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.