Hi Guys
My wife spilt a little water on a her laptop and it must have gotten into the hard drive because its now making a beeping noise at the start(like some sort of error code). I have taken the hard drive out and connected it externally and its still making the same sound and I cant seem to connect to it (no sound of spinning).
Its a samsung 2.5" sata drive. I'm wondering what the beeps mean and if there is anyway of getting data off the drive. I've tried using a usb-sata connector to read the drive with no luck (just the beep noise when starting).

Any ideas?

Post an audio sample of the noise. It could be head stiction.

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Sound of the beep. Lasts for about 3 seconds when first turned on.
http://www.4shared.com/audio/1FwSf-8s/Untitled.html

Posted a link to the audio file. I think its still waiting mod approval. Its a succession of beeps starting with a high pitch going down to a low pitch and repeats three times for.
If its a head stiction, Is there anything I can do? The outer casing of the hdd has "flower" shaped screws. Should I try to remove these and get into the inside?

I've posted a few replies but the mod hasn't approved them yet since its got links to audio files. So I'll just repeat what I said in those posts. The sound is a succession of beeps. Starts with a high pitch and goes down to a low pitch, which is repeated three times when first connected. But then there is not activity.
If it's "head stiction" then should I try to open up the hdd case and clean it in a clean room. I'm not a pro but is this something I can fix myself?

No! What ever you decide to do don't open it!

http://www.google.com/products/catalog? ... CFcQ8wIwAA

should do the trick

Stiction occurs when the head stack fails to correctly 'park' after powering off. As the heads are parked incorrectly attempts to start the motor fail because the presence of the head stack causes a resistance. Probably, depending on how many times you have powered the HDD, internal heads are already damaged or at least degraded.

Repair of this WILL consist of opening the HDD, but without the correct tools and experience here you could seriously make things a whole lot worse.

I suppose in theory this is something that you may be able to do yourself, though the risks are high and chance of success is low. Realistically if data is of any importance you need this looked at by a professional who can reliably repair the media long enough to secure a recovery of the data.

No No, you should not try this your self.
If it's sticktion you might end up like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7c_MTX6-gYg&feature=fvst
Then your cost has increased from $$ to $$$$$$$
I don't no a pro in Australia so you might look out for one localy.

Regards
Bosse

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Thanks for you help guys. Am I looking at big bucks here to get it fixed? Can the hard drive be made operational again
or am I just looking at data recovery only?

If you don't have US$650 to spend (or AU$650 for that matter), and you've decided to throw the drive in the rubbish, then try a little "percussive maintenance".

BTW do you understand the difference between a clean room and a cleanroom?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleanroom

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lol, yes. I figured that out after I started doing a bit more research (pardon my ignorance on that).

I'm not yet ready to start smashing the hard drive around yet. So I've decided to get a refurbished hard drive of the same model and replace the PCB on the faulty drive with the other hard drive. If that doesn't work then I still have the refurbished hard drive to chuck in the laptop.

I'm just curious to know if water actually has to get inside the case for stiction to occur, or is it caused by a electrical fault causing the head to do strange things?

didn't sound like stiction to me to me , I heard a head slap at the end.

The latter.

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