• Is my External HD Borked?
    11 replies, posted
Okay, just had seven heart attacks and I'm on the verge of another here. I have my big external drive plugged into my PC pretty much 24/7, and it generally holds a backlog of old, infrequently perused data I've jumped from PC to PC for the better part of a decade, if not more. Tonight I tried opening my drive, only for my explorer address bar to fill endlessly. I tried rebooting explorer.exe, but I couldn't even kill the process. Finally pulled the USB cord, and instantly my PC snapped to attention back to normal. Plugged back in, to hear the external hardware noise, but couldn't see a trace of the drive. Swapped out the cables just to see if that was the problem, and swapped the port they plugged in to. Nothing. Finally decided maybe Windows was just being dumb and needed a reboot. My PC got to the "Shuting Down..." message (Win7) and then did nothing. Mind you, I'm running on an SSD, so rebooting isn't exactly a long process... Lost patience and hard-booted. Started up again to see my motherboard report "9C" in the bottom right with a black screen... and then do absolutely nothing. Now... up-front... my computer is my LIFE. I'm not exactly a man of means, so a major hardware failure might actually result in my hanging myself with an extension cord, because I am THAT plugged-in. So... I freaked-out, instantly suspecting a motherboard failure (which might explain the connection not working) or some other thing I'd have to pay someone to diagnose... and then pay for replacement parts, and new copies of Windows, and whatever else. I live paycheck to paycheck, so this wouldn't really be an option. I could be hosed for months working back the cash to make it happen. But, in my blind panic, I pulled the power from the external HDD, and my PC immediately began booting like normal. So, at the moment, I'm terrified to even TOUCH the damn thing, let alone have it play havoc with my computer for reasons I don't understand. But I have to ask the question on the tin: is it borked? Is there a way to find out without paying some data-recovery company? Is it even LIKELY the whole thing isn't corrupted to shit, given it was forcing my entire PC to hang just by interfacing with it? I'd be incredibly sad if I lost everything on it... I think a REALLY old HDD still has SOME of those files, but I can't even quantify the potential loss. I'm nearly thirty, and I have shit from my early HIGH SCHOOL days sitting on that thing.
yeah try running speccy or crystaldiskinfo on the drive for a basic summary but it's probably dead 9c is just a USB boot error you can try just taking the hdd out of its external housing to make sure it isnt the usb sata interface or the freezer trick if the drive itself is dead i guess but i wouldn't look too far into it (amateur data recovery often ends in disappointment) take backups from now on
Take backups? That was the point of the external... I can't make backups of backups, I don't have that kind of space.
[QUOTE=Vigilante2470;51225245]Take backups? That was the point of the external... I can't make backups of backups, I don't have that kind of space.[/QUOTE] Well, if thats the backup. It means You still have the data somewhere else as well.
[QUOTE=Vigilante2470;51225245]Take backups? That was the point of the external... I can't make backups of backups, I don't have that kind of space.[/QUOTE] A backup is a copy of the data, usually stored in a disconnected state. Moving the data to an external drive is not a backup.
[QUOTE=Vigilante2470;51225245]Take backups? That was the point of the external... I can't make backups of backups, I don't have that kind of space.[/QUOTE] Single point of failure isn't a backup, you've learned the hard lesson here. Always make sure you have 3 places of your data stored, it can either be on physical drives or media or online, the rule of thumb is to keep the important stuff in 3 places. Have a main drive, backup of that drive, then a direct clone of that on either another drive or physical media and then as well as all of that, have it stored online if you feel it is a good option. Simple terms. Main Drive - External - Copy of External on another drive/media - Another copy of External on drive/media but stored at different location - Online sync of External This overall gives you 4 points of failure instead of 1, if the External dies you have another drive, if that dies, you have another drive, if that dies you then have an online sync that can be used to rebuild a new drive and so on. Never have a single point of failure with important files!
I told you I'm not rich... :cry: I can't afford multiple terabyte hard drives or some kind of cloud service that costs me a hundred dollars a month or something, let alone ALL of those options...
[QUOTE=Vigilante2470;51226515]I told you I'm not rich... :cry: I can't afford multiple terabyte hard drives or some kind of cloud service that costs me a hundred dollars a month or something, let alone ALL of those options...[/QUOTE] If you have a gmail account you've got access to google drive which gives you 15GB right off the bat, then there's MS OneDrive which again gives you 5GB for free but can be whacked up to 1TB for $7. Online storage isn't expensive at all as for backup drives, thrift stores and PC recycling centres will practically GIVE you HDDs if you go in and ask, it isn't hard to get backup media. Theres a local one near me that gives out recycled drives for £10 each, some are really bad because they mostly come from high schools but sometimes you find absolute steals, I've seen enterprise grade WDs in their piles before. Charities are a god send at times.
Hi @Vigilante2470! I'm sorry to hear about the drive troubles, man - I know this could be extremely frustrating... At this point the best option I see you can try to gain access to the data is to boot up with Linux Live CD with the external disconnected and after you plug it in try to get the information back. However, do have in mind that you need to move the data to another location. Here's a KB article about LiveCD and how to boot up with it: [url]https://help.ubuntu.com/community/LiveCD[/url] Hopefully it will do the job, but if it doesn't then it will be best to consult with a data recovery company. Also, I agree with the others about how important the backup is - I personally like (and use) the so called 3-2-1 backup strategy where 3 copies of the same data are stored on 2 different storage devices and 1 offsite. It's not necessary to follow this one in particular, but the main idea is not to store all your eggs in one basket. Let us know how it went.
[QUOTE=Mighty_Miro_W;51232076]Hi @Vigilante2470! I'm sorry to hear about the drive troubles, man - I know this could be extremely frustrating... At this point the best option I see you can try to gain access to the data is to boot up with Linux Live CD with the external disconnected and after you plug it in try to get the information back. However, do have in mind that you need to move the data to another location. Here's a KB article about LiveCD and how to boot up with it: [url]https://help.ubuntu.com/community/LiveCD[/url] Hopefully it will do the job, but if it doesn't then it will be best to consult with a data recovery company. Also, I agree with the others about how important the backup is - I personally like (and use) the so called 3-2-1 backup strategy where 3 copies of the same data are stored on 2 different storage devices and 1 offsite. It's not necessary to follow this one in particular, but the main idea is not to store all your eggs in one basket. Let us know how it went.[/QUOTE] I wish my clients used that philosphy. Most people seem daunted by Linux. I have had people argue with me that ntfs3g doesn't work and doubt that its even functioning because its open source linux. But the fact is that ntfs3g handles the file system MUCH better than windows does. The only problem is that sometimes the file system gets locked and may need to be forced. ntfs3g will tell you what to run and its a bit of a handfull to type out sometimes but it the drive works, this is about your only option besides using a low level recovery software that you'll end up shitting money out for. Another important bit of information is that the drive needs to be attached to the SATA controller and not eSata/USB. This provides better results and removes incompatabilities with the enclosure hardware. External drives in my opinion are usually trash depending on manufacturer. If you're going with a backup, make sure you have a drive that is designed for backup roles. Also never run your Backup on your same system, and if you got the money or time setup a NAS for onsite backusp.
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.