External hard drive dropped: how to recover
Maile
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Le_quidam_Six2 -
Le_quidam_Six2 -
Hello,
I dropped my external hard drive and it no longer works (when I plug it in, the light blinks and it makes a "tap-tap-tap" noise. I took it to a little shop where they opened it. Apparently, I can reuse the enclosure etc. by putting in a new drive, but mine is toast and they can't recover the files.
When they connect it (I don’t really know to what or how) they get a lot of error messages.
The technician showed me another drive to explain the problem, it seems to be a kind of piece that reminds me of the arms of old record players to read the disc.
He told me the only solution would be to send it to Switzerland and that it costs 1000€/megabyte to recover. The work on this drive represents several months of work but I can't afford to pay several thousand euros to recover it.
Do you have any other ideas? The most important files to recover are Word documents, PDFs, and JPEGs. Maybe it’s possible to recover them from the internal hard drive memory of the PC I was working on with this external drive?
Anyway, I don’t know much about this but I am really devastated by this data loss. Can someone help me?
Thanks in advance,
Maile
Configuration: Windows XP / Firefox 11.0
I dropped my external hard drive and it no longer works (when I plug it in, the light blinks and it makes a "tap-tap-tap" noise. I took it to a little shop where they opened it. Apparently, I can reuse the enclosure etc. by putting in a new drive, but mine is toast and they can't recover the files.
When they connect it (I don’t really know to what or how) they get a lot of error messages.
The technician showed me another drive to explain the problem, it seems to be a kind of piece that reminds me of the arms of old record players to read the disc.
He told me the only solution would be to send it to Switzerland and that it costs 1000€/megabyte to recover. The work on this drive represents several months of work but I can't afford to pay several thousand euros to recover it.
Do you have any other ideas? The most important files to recover are Word documents, PDFs, and JPEGs. Maybe it’s possible to recover them from the internal hard drive memory of the PC I was working on with this external drive?
Anyway, I don’t know much about this but I am really devastated by this data loss. Can someone help me?
Thanks in advance,
Maile
Configuration: Windows XP / Firefox 11.0
7 answers
Hello,
I'm sorry to inform you like this, but indeed the read/write heads are damaged, and possibly even a small area of the disk (where they impacted during the fall).
As it stands, it's not possible to recover the data using software because it's a physical failure rather than a logical one. Only laboratories can do this because the mechanical part you mentioned needs to be replaced: the read arm.
All of this must be done in a clean room, meaning the air is filtered 100% so that no particles settle on the platters once the disk is opened. Therefore, opening your disk would also cause irreparable damage.
Regarding recovery, there are many sites, possibly in Switzerland, but also in France. For example, with this simple search.
Moreover, the price that was indicated to you seems exorbitant, and it seems to me that there are much cheaper options (150 - 750€ for individuals, much more for professionals or companies). Packages usually include the cost of the new disk onto which your data will be copied once recovered.
Do your own research
Be humble and polite towards the volunteers at CCM and remember to indicate if your problem is resolved.
I'm sorry to inform you like this, but indeed the read/write heads are damaged, and possibly even a small area of the disk (where they impacted during the fall).
As it stands, it's not possible to recover the data using software because it's a physical failure rather than a logical one. Only laboratories can do this because the mechanical part you mentioned needs to be replaced: the read arm.
All of this must be done in a clean room, meaning the air is filtered 100% so that no particles settle on the platters once the disk is opened. Therefore, opening your disk would also cause irreparable damage.
Regarding recovery, there are many sites, possibly in Switzerland, but also in France. For example, with this simple search.
Moreover, the price that was indicated to you seems exorbitant, and it seems to me that there are much cheaper options (150 - 750€ for individuals, much more for professionals or companies). Packages usually include the cost of the new disk onto which your data will be copied once recovered.
Do your own research
Be humble and polite towards the volunteers at CCM and remember to indicate if your problem is resolved.
beliza1972
Thank you for your response. I too lost all my files due to the fall of my external hard drive, which is all scratched because it was in operation at the time of the fall :/ When you say between 150 and 750€, is that for recovering a megabyte or for all the data? My hard drive is 500 gigabytes. Thank you for your advice. I also have very precious data on this drive, but I can't afford to spend hundreds of euros to recover it. Happy holidays to everyone.
