HD Really Dead?

Ok, so I know this is going to sound ignorant, but I thought I'd ask anyway. Months ago my Mac suddenly didn't recognize my HD anymore. I literally had a disc in my hand to back up the computer when this happened. I lost everything. I took it to be repaired, but the store said they tried 3 times and couldn't recover anything on my HD so they installed a new one.

I'm just wondering if my HD is really totally gone, or if anyone can think of something I could do to recover files (the only things I really care about are the pictures and videos of my kids that I lost).

Thanks

Sorry to hear that! I had that happen once to me some time ago and I learned my lesson to never keep just one copy of everything on my computers HD. ALWAYS back it up on an external drive.

But anyway....

I do know of one company here is the DFW area (they'll do work all over) that can recover things of almost any hard drive failure issue. They actually have a contract with the local government here to do the same for their stuff and such. Let me look into them and see if I can gather more information on them for you. I only know of them though, I haven't personally used them.

A little warning on them though...they are EXPENSIVE for the work that they do...either because it really does take that much time and man hours to do it, or because they just can...I don't know honestly. It might not be worth it in your case but that's up to you to decide. Either way I'll get back to you asap.

Slukie said:

Ok, so I know this is going to sound ignorant, but I thought I'd ask anyway. Months ago my Mac suddenly didn't recognize my HD anymore. I literally had a disc in my hand to back up the computer when this happened. I lost everything. I took it to be repaired, but the store said they tried 3 times and couldn't recover anything on my HD so they installed a new one.

I'm just wondering if my HD is really totally gone, or if anyone can think of something I could do to recover files (the only things I really care about are the pictures and videos of my kids that I lost).

Thanks

Click to expand...

Two Things:
1) Mount the dead HD in an External USB HD enclosure. Stick it in the freezer for at least 24 hours. Take it out, and IMMEDIATELY hook it up to the Mac. It MIGHT spin up and be recognized by the system. If so - work fast, you have about 10 min then it will croak again. (This sounds like I am F**ing with you, but it might work).

2) If not, the send it out to Data Ontrack for data recovery. Worst case: They will remove the platters from inside the dead disk and mount them in their own enclosure, then recover the data to a CD or DVD for you. Big $$$ though.

Try the freezer first.

You can try this:

Place the hard drive in an external USB SATA carrier and attach it to your Mac. If the drive mounts and can be read, you should be able to copy files from it to your internal hard drive. If the drive mounts but the files can not be read, you can try special software.

I recommend "Stellar Data Recovery" software. This software is not free and is a bit expensive, ($99.00) however, you can download a free trial which will enable you to determine if the files can be recovered or not. If they can, pay for the software and they will immediately send you a registration key. I have used their software successfully on a dead CD that had valuable photos that I badly needed to recover.

If the drive will not mount at all, there's not much you can do except send it off to a data recovery depot. And that will be very expensive.

Regards.

ticedoff8 said:

Two Things:
1) Mount the dead HD in an External USB HD enclosure. Stick it in the freezer for at least 24 hours. Take it out, and IMMEDIATELY hook it up to the Mac. It MIGHT spin up and be recognized by the system. If so - work fast, you have about 10 min then it will croak again. (This sounds like I am F**ing with you, but it might work).

2) If not, the send it out to Data Ontrack for data recovery. Worst case: They will remove the platters from inside the dead disk and mount them in their own enclosure, then recover the data to a CD or DVD for you. Big $$$ though.

Try the freezer first.

Click to expand...

I am curious about DataOnTrack services. I'm not convinced they remove the discs and mount them in their own enclosure. It's not that simple. Do they do this work in a clean room environment? What do they use to read the platters? Having worked in the hard disc drive industry for the past 12 years, I'd like to know.

Ron Scott

10.4: Recover a dead hard drive using GNU ddrescue - Mac OS X Hints

Recover a dead hard drive using dd - Mac OS X Hints

Thanks for the responses everyone. I will try a bunch of the suggestions to see if any work. From what I recall, the store said the did try keeping the HD in the freezer for a bit as well. Ah well, I was able to recover some of the items from other sources, just not everything.

Thanks again.