Dead hard drive - lost digital video files

[Crocuta]

Well disaster has struck. I plugged in my Maxtor 5000DV 200GB external hard drive last night and nothing happened. Okay, well something happened, but not what I expected. The disk didn't spin up. Instead, it clicked and the unit played me a pretty little tune that I assume is some sort of diagnostic for the unit. Anyway, to put it a different way... it's broke.

I called Maxtor, hoping that it might be something on their logic board and that they could fix it without losing my data. (All of my DV projects are on there.) Unfortunately, while they're happy to replace it, they'll just send me a new unit in a box and I'll send this one back. Data gone!

Okay, so here's what I want to discuss here. Has anyone here ever used a data recovery service? I have the feeling that the data is there and recoverable, but I have no idea how much it would cost or how they would even get that much data back to me. After all, that's why I bought such a big drive... that would be lots of DVDs to back up. Anyway, I guess I'm just looking to see if someone might be able to say, "Yes I did that once. It was cheap and it worked well. Here's the company I used."

It's not escaping my notice that if I do the data recovery it is not only costing me the price of the recovery service, but the value of this large hard drive. It won't be under warranty any more after they've torn into it. Any thoughts?

[Jason Dunn]

Ouch. So sorry to hear that happened to you! 8O

I'm not sure what prices are like in your part of the world, but a friend of mine had something similar happen. He contacted a hard drive recovery service, and they wanted $300 CND just to look at it, and another $1000 CND to do a recovery if they thought they might be able to get his data - and there was no refund if they were unsuccessful. :? He just accepted that his data was gone and started over.

Since the drive is dead already, it can't hurt to try this if you're not interested in going the data recovery route:

1) Turn the drive upside down, then gently tap on the bottom, then turn it over ahead. Sometimes you can reset the heads this way enough to salvage your data.

or

2) Put the drive in the freezer overnight, let thaw for a full day, then try plugging it in. I don't know if this is an urban myth or not, but again, if you have nothing to lose...

[Lee Yuan Sheng]

Data might still be salvageable. It sounds like the motor died. It's just a matter of whether you're willing to shell out the bucks!

[Crocuta]

Since the drive is dead already, it can't hurt to try this if you're not interested in going the data recovery route:

1) Turn the drive upside down, then gently tap on the bottom, then turn it over ahead. Sometimes you can reset the heads this way enough to salvage your data.

Great news! I got my data back at no cost!!! Funny you should mention this, Jason. I did contact some data recovery firms and they were all way out of my price range (along the lines you mentioned). Couldn't happen.

Then this nice guy told me something along the lines of what you said here. He asked if the drive had crashed while running or just didn't start up. When I told him it just didn't start up, he said many of the drives they get that just didn't spin up have just had their spindle stuck. The first thing they do is give them power and give them a few good sharp raps. About half the time, that gets them going and they can extract the data by just copying it. He emphasized that the drive is still bad and so you should just get your data off and replace it.

I had nothing to lose, as I was just going to send the drive back to Maxtor anyway, so I gave it about three sharp raps on the side (man, that was hard to make myself do!) and the sucker started spinning. :way to go: Between spare space on my internal hard drives and some DVD's, I was able to get all my data off the drive.

It makes sense now that I think about it. The tolerances inside that drive must be miniscule and even a little problem could stop it from spinning. I bet that's what the freezer thing does too. By making the components contract, different materials by different amounts, it probably helps to break loose a stuck spindle.

Anyway, thanks for the tips! I wouldn't have volunteered to test out theories like this, but it's good to have a record of this on the forums in case anyone else has this problem later. When you have nothing else to lose, then drastic measures may be just the thing to try.

[Jason Dunn]

Great to hear!

[backpackerx]

Man, I'm going to keep that in mind if I ever suffer through that!

[encece]

Banging it about would have been my natural reaction if that happened to me. Now I'll just have to remember to plaug it back in and try it again (if I dont destroy it).

Glad to hear you fixed your problem. It's stories like that that mmake me realize I should really start backing up my data. One bad crash and all of my pics, vids, and music will be GONE!