Hi super human computer peoples......

Just last saturday, my new laptop crashed hard!... I was browsing ebay, had around 5 browsers open and Itunes playing some music to keep me sane.

Firstly, i clicked on an ebay image and saved the pic and as i did so, the screen dimmed and froze...i sat and waited a minute and the screen came back in full brightness again at which time i thought, well...i think ill kill some browsers...as i clicked the first browser to close....my laptop shut down, then rebooted....a nice message on the top left came up with... "unable to load operating system"....

well..i didnt freak out totally but it was a concern...so i manually rebooted the system...then waa laa!..same bloody message...I started getting alittle edgy now and fired up my PC to do some research on the meaning to this. There was a mention that if i had a remote usb hardrive connected to my lappy, that sometimes, on a reboot, it can cause issues...And yes...I did have my external drive still hooked in....so i pulled the bugger out...rebooted the lappy again...same response people..."unable to load operating system.....

Ok...at this point im kinda going into shock and because i already have no hair, am bashing my head against the wall some...hopefully to make some sense of this all...anyway...I tried the recovery disk method and it came up with... "blah blah blah...boot sector not found or repairable"....at this time i yelled out to the missus..."babe...better keep the coffee coming, this is going to be a long one!"

Ok....Laptop is covered under warranty (tick),....Have loaner laptop sent to me by the company for 60days no charge (tick)...Pulled out faulty HDD from lappy and inserted into a remote usb case (tick)....Downloaded and payed for Data recovery software called Recover My files V4 (tick)...

Here is the prblem my dear computer geeky and popular friends of astounding knowledge etc...

This data recovery scanning and saving procedure has taken 3 days now...constant on a dedicated computer...

Should this be taking soooooo long?
Ive stopped and started and sector ranges a couple of times as per help file info in the software...

So far it has found minimal of anything... but all these lostfile_exe files that go... 13kb then 3kb then 13kb then 3kb and so far into infinite... 20450 of them... What the hell are these?

I really am hoping to get as much info off this drive before i send my laptop in for its warranty repair....

To help you out a bit more....

The drive is a 640gig Western Digital with a manufacturers 12gig front partition that cant be looked at.....then there is a 100meg partition that runs into a 596gig or so final partition...all labelled as RAW now....no NTFS...and the operating system was windows 7.

I have all my childrens new pics on it since the last 6 months as that is when i brought the laptop (Acer Aspire 5400G)
It also has all my photo shoots of my airbrushing work and templates from my buiseness with documents that are dear to me aswell and very important. (silly me for not backing up from the start )

Any help on this would be great..im telling you it would be absolutely monumental!!

Thanks for listening to my rant and many regards to you all
Corbin Styles

Yes, that was a bit of a rant, wasn't it!

In short, I wouldn't start from where you are now. The very slow reading from the original disk likely indicates read problems, and because you are recovering directly from that original disk, you may have few (if any) chances to repeat this (as the disk may be deteriorating, the longer that it is used in that state). Therefore you should consider your options and plan carefully, rather than just trying everything possible. Unfortunately, recovering directly from the original disk was not a good idea when the disk is faulty, but the recovery software companies don't always point that out...

If, having considered the risks, you choose to continue with DIY recovery attempts (which can increase the costs, and/or decrease the chances of success, if you do eventually decide to give the job to a DR pro), then I'd recommend making a "clone" of the problem disk first. Alternatively, if the data is very important to you, then you may want to consider asking here for recommended DR companies (especially any which are local to Australia to minimise shipping / customs issues, if that's a concern).

Some cloning software (e.g. ddrescue) can be configured to quickly grab the readable sectors first, skip those which need retries during that first pass, and later can be configured to go back and "try harder" to get those areas which need retries. However - such software reuiqres some skill to use effectively; if you get the cloning process wrong, you could overwrite the very data you are trying to save; and the disk could fail catastropically part-way through the cloning anyway. Recovery results are typically better when the faulty disk is attached direct, and not via USB, though nothing is guaranteed, of course. You also need a suitable amount of unused disk space to hold the clone image, and additional space for any data which can later be recovered (perhaps using the software you've already bought) by reading from that clone.

As I said, such a process is not risk-free - if you searching for "cloning" here, you'll find several other threads on this subject. Good luck!

If the disk you want to recover data from shows hardware problems, and it looks like your disk does, go to a data recovery professional. Period.
Well, of course, if you're interested in the results rather than in the process of data recovery.
And this says a man who sells data recovery software.

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R-Studio Data Recovery Software

Thanks for your advice you two..

i have stopped going any further with the recovery in a "DIY" manner and totally appreciate and understand what you guys are saying...

This is out of my league...and as Jim Carey would say.. "Im a doctor NOT a pool man Jim"..

Actually, im an airbrush artist, not a HDD expert...

Anyway thanks heaps and your forum is an excellent source that i will constantly have a look through...

Regards
Corbin Styles