Ok, my work laptop's HD crashed this morning. It was a physical failure (cylinder failure). The IT helpdesk is sending a technician out on Wed. to help recover my work files, but probably won't help me recover any personal files. I have all of my digital photos, mp3's, financial info., etc. on the computer (I travel all week, so I use my laptop for personal stuff too - a no-no, I know).

Basically, the computer tells me it can't find an O/S, and a loud clicking noise comes from the hard drive.

Is there any way to pull the HD and hook it up to my new laptop, then read it as an external drive? That way I can transfer files from the old HD to my new one? I'm assuming that's what the IT guys are going to do, so I'd like to be able to do the same before they wipe everything out.

What a pain in the ass. . . at least I got a new IBM T42 today! This computer is pretty sweet.

 

depending on what the problem is, there are any number of solutions, but if the physical drive is not working, then connecting it to another laptop probably wont work. but there is hope, if for instance, the drive just got stuck (happend to my wife's laptop, all he has to do is move the control arm back into place and the drive (should) spin properly again, then you should have everything back. there are also other ways to take the plates out of the drive and get the data directly from them, but that gets a lot more in depth.

 

I've had the click of death in a desktop once before. Not saying this will help, but I turned it off and on a few dozen times (don't ask me why, I'm usually not that persistent) and it eventually came back to life. I immediately transferred all my files off the drive and then replaced it.

This also happened to my gf's sister and it came back to life too, but only for a day or so.

It might be worth a shot. You've only got 30 minutes of your life to lose ;-)

 

your company's tech won't be able to recover most likely.

if the data is important, you can ship the drive to a data retreival specialist. since the drive is intact, they will probably be able to help. it is NOT cheap, though.

 

I am a technician and we usually see this problem for our users. Here are the methods we try to recover data:

* Try to capture an image of the HDD using Symantec Ghost with CRC Ignore and Force Cloning option.

* Try putting the HDD in an external enclosure and hook it up to a working laptop to extract files. If you have a dell C series, you can get a modular bay that attaches to the cdrom bay of the laptop.

* If the HDD is really bad and would not spin, we actually put the HDD in the freezer for 30-45 mins and then try ghosting it or try hooking it up as a slave. Odd but it worked a couple of times for me.

* Worse case scenario is that you need to send the HDD to a data retrieval specialist. $1300 just for them to take a look at it, does not matter if the recover any data or not. If they do recover data, there is an additional charge on top of the 1300. NOT CHEAP as what steven said.

Good Luck!

 

Wow, thanks for the advice guys. Looks like there's nothing I can do about this at home. I did try to shut down and restart a few times, but the tech told me to stop doing that because I could further damage the drive. She also mentioned the data retreival specialist route, and that it was extremely expensive. If that's the way we go, I highly doubt they'll pay to get my 5 gigs of family vaction/birthday/S2000/etc. pics out of the computer. Oh well. I just hope that someone can recover all of my work files. I'm stupid and hadn't backed anything up. Serves me right for never going in for "home office" days. . .

 

On the bright side, you got a brand new ThinkPad. I have the T41p and it's the best notebook I've owned, bar none.

 

I agree. This T42 is awesome. I just fired it up and it instantly connected to my Wifi at home, at work, at the client site. . . no problems. Plus, it's an XP machine, vs. Windows 2000 for my old one. We also switched over to Outlook from Netscape. The jury is definitely out on this one. Not sure Outlook is better. Overall happy I got the new machine, though I wish I didn't have to recreate 3 months of modeling and data collection.

 

I have found that with older drives there is such a dust build up inside the actual drive that it prevents the control arm from moving. At times it could also force the control arm to stick.
I know it sounds kind of ghetto but take the HDD in one hand and knock it hard into your other hand. This will either knock loose the dirt or reset the control arm. Its very unusual that a control arm on a HDD will just die out.

 

I have 2 methods of B/U

1) I save my docs and email archive weekly to an external LaCie 250GB HD dedicated to just archiving and B/U.

2) I have my intern burn a DVD of my critical files off of that HD every two weeks. DVD is then stored in my briefcase then in home archive. I love having interns.

Corp IT does a full sys B/U using a differential Exabyte tape system but it is all under same roof. What if there is a massive fire??

A colleague had his laptop stolen at an airport and he almost lost his job due to the huge risk he put his customers/clients at. Too much info in one HD.

Plan ahead for this guys!