Hard Drive crashed, REALLY need some help

[REDtoLINE]

Ok, so windows will no longer boot, i get a black screen that says "Disk Read Error!" on it. Now, i really don't care about the hard drive, i can always buy a new one, but there are some very important files on that hard drive, that i never backed up. I don't have another hard drive to install windows on, so here is my question: what can i do to get to the files on the hard drive? Am i able to boot off the windows disc? Do i have to buy another hard drive, install windows on that, and then access it as a secondary hard drive? What are my options here, and what is the best and SAFEST way to attempt to recover this data?

Also, do you guys have any reccomendations on what to do to try and prevent this from happening in the future? I have heard to put your page file on a second hard drive.

Thanks for the help,
Nick

 

[REDtoLINE]

can somebody please help me? it is very important that i get this data back

 

[V00D00]

Safest way to recover your data is to pay out the ass and have a data recovery company take care of it for you. They will probably be able to recover most of your data, but you will have to pay a whole bunch of money ($ thousands).

Your best bet is to try and freeze the drive. Put it in a ziplock bag and into the freezer for a few hours.

If it's a power issue, then that probably won't work. If you hear the drive spin up, then that method will most likely work. You have nothing to lose either way though, right?

You will want to put the drive (when you take it out of the freezer) into a working computer and copy all the files you need off of it as quick as you can. You don't have long before it gets warm. Only copy what you absolutely need.

Putting your page file on a second drive has nothing to do with protecting you from a drive crashing. You can just backup your hard drive weekly or something. Buy an external hard drive and setup a backup schedule that runs automatically. Or you can use a RAID array like I do. I have a RAID 1 array in my computer. I have 2 300gb drives that act as one mirrored 300gb drive. So if one ever crashes, all my data is still accessible from the other drive.

 

[MrDudeMan]

you need to buy a new hard drive no matter what, so you should go ahead and do that.

there could be a few things wrong with the driver...it could have crashed and totally destroyed all of your data, or it could just be the MBR broke or something. you can get another drive, install windows, then hookup your current drive as a slave or through an external harddrive connector and see if you can get it to work long enough to copy your files off.

if you are really desperate and the files are extremely important, you can send the drive to some of the companies that will literally take the drive apart and read the platters with a machine to get your files. that costs a lot of $$$ though.

 

[REDtoLINE]

Well here is the thing, I don't necesarily think that the drive is broken. I think that some files became corrupted. I was playing Counter-Strike, and suddenly, my computer froze, so i had to do a hard reset (hold down the power button). After my computer rebooted, the windows loading bar came up, and i went to go get a drink. When i came back, my computer was frozen again on this windows loading screen, so i had to yet again, do another hard reset. After the computer rebooted again, it came up and said, "Verifying DMI pool data... A Disk Read Error Occurred!". Now, although i am not 100% sure that the hard drive is still ok, i think this is a corrupt data issue. I would like to somehow boot my computer up from another source, and try and backup my data that way. Can i create a bootable CD-ROM or Floppy? Or is my only option to buy a new hard drive, and install windows on it?

Thanks again,
Nick

PS - Is it possible to setup a RAID array with 2 hard drive that are different sizes? I have a 74GB Raptor right now, but if i bought a 250GB WD, can i setup those 2 drives in a RAID array?

 

[Spinne]

Go look for Knoppix Linux on the internet. Burn it to a CD and boot off the CD (Knoppix doesn't save anything to your HDD). It's very important that you do nothing to the drive until you're sure of a method to retrieve the data because trying to write even a single file on it right now may overwrite the data you're trying to retrieve.

 

[RKS]

Text

 

[zephyrprime]

Either put the drive in another computer with windows already on it and copy the files off or use Knoppixe like spinne says to copy the data off onto an external drive or usb key.

 

[REDtoLINE]

Ok, so i downloaded, and booted from my Knoppix disc, and it cannot find my hard drive. I don't think it is the knoppix, i think it is the hard drive. There must be some kind of mechanical problem. Now i am not sure what i should do. That data on there is not important enough to even spend over $100 to retrieve, but there must be something else i can do.

 

[biostud]

does the drive show up in the BIOS?

 

[REDtoLINE]

yes it does show up in the bios, so it's not a connection problem (plus i already tried using a different SATA cable, on a different port, and also tried using the alternate power connection)

 

[jondl]

set the hard drive as first boot. maybe that will work.

 

[aatf510]

Originally posted by: REDtoLINE

PS - Is it possible to setup a RAID array with 2 hard drive that are different sizes? I have a 74GB Raptor right now, but if i bought a 250GB WD, can i setup those 2 drives in a RAID array?

Yes, you can, but it would be totally pointless.
If you setup the above two drives in a RAID 1 array for data security, you would lose the capacity of the 250GB drive because it would use the smaller capacity of the two drives, and you would lose the speed of the raptor because you would have to wait for the slower 250GB drive reponse.

 

[JRock]

Originally posted by: toattett

Originally posted by: REDtoLINE

PS - Is it possible to setup a RAID array with 2 hard drive that are different sizes? I have a 74GB Raptor right now, but if i bought a 250GB WD, can i setup those 2 drives in a RAID array?

Yes, you can, but it would be totally pointless.
If you setup the above two drives in a RAID 1 array for data security, you would lose the capacity of the 250GB drive because it would use the smaller capacity of the two drives, and you would lose the speed of the raptor because you would have to wait for the slower 250GB drive reponse.

Correct.

Expensive but always works as a last resort (assuming you didn't beat the ****** out of the drive trying to recover the data by yourself)

 

[REDtoLINE]

Ok, so i tried to access the data with knoppix, and no luck. Then i remembered that one of my other computers actually had 2 sata ports on it, so i tried putting it in there, and windows says that the data is corrupt and won't let me access the drive. So i thought, ok, i will try the freezer method. I put it in there for exactly 1 hour, and tried the drive again in the other computer, and still no luck. So i am going to try to leave it in there for more than an hour, but i don't think i will get any luck. Does anyone have any other ideas on how i can get my data back, without spending tons of money for the recovery teams to open my hard drive up, and charge me $1000s?

 

[V00D00]

Yeah, stop putting it in the freezer. The freezer trick is for physical problems (ie. motors, platters), not logical.

Now with this new information it's clear that you need to put that drive into a working computer, and run some recovery software. Have you tried that? You won't be able to access it directly with anything, you'll need software like GetDataBack or Encase.

Since your bios recognizes it, there's no problem with the actual drive. You may even be able to rebuild the mbr and mft and be alright. I would highly suggest you run some recovery software before you try to repair the mft or mbr.

 

[V00D00]

Originally posted by: REDtoLINE
PS - Is it possible to setup a RAID array with 2 hard drive that are different sizes? I have a 74GB Raptor right now, but if i bought a 250GB WD, can i setup those 2 drives in a RAID array?

Yes, it is possible, but it would be hugely stupid. You would be limiting the raptor to the speed of the slower 250gb WD drive.

In doing so you would also drop down the size of your 250gb drive to 74gb. So you're losing a hundred and thirty gb.

What are you trying to accomplish? Do you want to do a mirroring raid?