A CALL FOR HELP

[Taelon]

It is with grave sadness that I must tell you that I have suffered a near-ultimate disaster - despite all the precautions I have always taken...

In the morning hours of July 15, 2003, my brandnew Western Digital 80MB harddisk died a sudden and unexpected death, taking all of my stuff - EVERYTHING - with it. And I was just going to do a backup but never had a chance.

My latest backup is a couple weeks old, and there's a LOT of changes I need to get back. Ohyeah, and Windows XP Professional's Backup app is a complete joke. I have no way of restoring said backup, other than throwing all the files within it into a folder (I got another new harddisk, a Maxtor 120GB, and reinstalled XP Pro from scratch). BAH!

So I'm stuck, and faced with having to do ALL of the goddamned work I spent so much time over the past month with again. Tried an ASR restore but Windows refused to, after spending a full hour on needlessly reformatting my Maxtor drive. BAH!!!

Now I need your help.

I may be sending the Western Digital HD to a professional data recovery service, probably DriveSavers. Since that's going to burn a hole into my finances, I'm wondering if some of you would help me out with a donation via PayPal or something....

Alternatively, I've done some newsgroup browsing (I'm on my old Compaq btw.), and it's been suggested that one swap out the electronics on the failed drive, or keep it in the freezer overnight then thaw it out the next day and try using it one more time, or even OPEN IT UP and give the platters a spin with one's hand, then back up everything before dust starts destroying the drive..... Some pretty wild ideas out there.

Incidentally, what my drive's doing is spin up and down a few times, click loudly while doing so, then shut off - meanwhile the BIOS cannot see the drive anymore. Apparently a somewhat common issue with Western Digital harddisks.....

Any thoughts on this?

Or on helping out with professional recovery?

<-- cannot believe this is happening to him, NOW of all times

 

[Jaded God]

So that is where you have been!!! And that explains not talking to anyone...

I will try to help however I can... PM/e-mail/IM me da1m0n.

 

[Myname]

I'm finding it somewhat hard to believe that you're asking us to help pay for the fixing of your hard drive..

 

[mal]

All these stories of hard disk failure is making a Raid 1 set up sound attractive.

 

[racketboy]

of SCSIs

 

[mal]

It doesn't have to be.

7200rpm ATA133 would do nicely.

 

[racketboy]

Originally posted by mal@Jul 18, 2003 @ 03:04 PM

It doesn't have to be.

7200rpm ATA133 would do nicely.

I meant for reliability

SCSIs usually don't die as often

 

[mal]

I find that hard to believe.

Mechanically there can't be that much difference between a SCSI and an ATA drive. :huh

 

[racketboy]

Originally posted by mal@Jul 18, 2003 @ 03:17 PM

I find that hard to believe.

Mechanically there can't be that much difference between a SCSI and an ATA drive. :huh

I don't know if it's a mechanical matter or not, but it's a fairly well known fact in the IT industry that SCSI are less likely to poop out on you.

I head lots of cases of IDE drives dying after a year or two.

Don't hear much about that with SCSI

That why most professional grade servers use SCSI and why SCSI is more expensive.

Otherwise there's no reason to buy SCSIs.

Most IDEs can reach speeds of most SCSIs and the storage per $ of IDE blows SCSI away

 

[Tagrineth]

SCSI drives tend to be built like tanks because their target market is IT.

But anyway, Taelon, frankly, quit fucking around with subpar drive manufacturers. Screw Western Digital, screw Maxtor, I've heard enough stories of those failing.

Get Seagate.

 

[ExCyber]

Mechanically there can't be that much difference between a SCSI and an ATA drive.

Here's the thing - it's true that SCSI is really just a protocol. However, if you look at the industry, it quickly becomes apparent that modern SCSI drives are based on different designs and design goals than modern ATA drives; when was the last time you saw a 36.4GB ATA drive, or a 80GB SCSI drive? Or, getting more to the point, why do you think the major manufacturers all just dropped the typical warranty on their ATA drives to 1 year?

 

[racketboy]

Originally posted by ExCyber@Jul 18, 2003 @ 06:11 PM

Mechanically there can't be that much difference between a SCSI and an ATA drive.

Here's the thing - it's true that SCSI is really just a protocol. However, if you look at the industry, it quickly becomes apparent that modern SCSI drives are based on different designs and design goals than modern ATA drives; when was the last time you saw a 36.4GB ATA drive, or a 80GB SCSI drive? Or, getting more to the point, why do you think the major manufacturers all just dropped the typical warranty on their ATA drives to 1 year?

as opposed to like 5 for SCSI

good point

 

[Taelon]

Originally posted by Myname@Jul 18, 2003 @ 06:00 AM

I'm finding it somewhat hard to believe that you're asking us to help pay for the fixing of your hard drive..

Why

After all, some of you know me from DC++ where I (used to) hang out day and night and let people download my shared files. Hey, it doesn't hurt to ask. Besides, I wanted your thoughts on other, last-resort kind of ways to get my HD going one more time and salvage its contents.

I ran and bought the Maxtor because it was there, and at a good price, and I wanted a replacement drive now. According to various review sites, it seems a ton better than the WD. Although I agree that Seagate drives rock...

Anyway... nobody seems to actually care for my plight

not even a simple "sorry to hear that Taelon"

so go ahead with your small talk about SCSI and RAID, and I'll bite the bullet, reinstall XP and do all of the work setting it up all over again - then reintegrate the files from my old backup.

(EDIT: Forgive me, I'm just still really bummed. Don't nobody take me personal now, ya hear.)

At least OnTrack is willing to retrieve a complete file listing from my WD for just $100 (after that, I have the option to decide whether to have them actually recover the filesystem, and file for bankruptcy while I'm at it).

Who thought I'd thank my lucky stars to have the old Compaq Presario around in this time of need? The very computer I thought I'd outgrown for good?

 

[racketboy]

sorry to hear that Taelon

really

Isn't your drive under warrenty though? I thought you just got that box?

 

[Scared0o0Rabbit]

I remember hearing from one of the major harddrive companies several months back that the difference between scsi and ata were quite a bit less than most people realised. That hte biggest difference was supposedly the amount of testing done on teh drives, apparently SCSI gets much more thorough testing before shipment.

 

[Taelon]

Originally posted by racketboy@Jul 18, 2003 @ 05:06 PM

sorry to hear that Taelon

really

Isn't your drive under warrenty though? I thought you just got that box?

thanks buddy

Yeah, I'm sure the drive IS under warranty. But I can't send it in for an exchange just yet, since all my stuff is still on it (plus I have reason to believe the platters are actually undamaged). I'm hoping that OnTrack sends my drive back along with whatever data they recover so I can then exchange it. A new WD drive would then just become my D: drive...

Oh, and even though data recovery centers have to open drives, they can do it such that the manufacturer's warranty is still valid after re-closing the drive...pretty neat.

* currently browsing for HD cooling fan and new power supply - I don't trust the one I have anymore *

 

[mal]

Originally posted by Taelon@Jul 19, 2003 @ 07:02 AM

After all, some of you know me from DC++ where I (used to) hang out day and night and let people download my shared files. Hey, it doesn't hurt to ask.

Have you asked your loyal fans from the hub for donations?

You have my sympathy - losing a drive would suck - but asking for financial assistance?

 

[IBarracudaI]

What's happening these days???

Two days ago, partition magic messed up my seagate 80gb, and I lost 80% of its contents... including 55gigs of saturn isos

DAMN PARTITION MAGIC!

My prob was at a "higher" level.. partition magic crashed while moving data over the disk... _all_ files became corrupt...

But... isos we can rip them again... work is different

 

[Myname]

Originally posted by mal+Jul 19, 2003 @ 06:44 PM--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(mal @ Jul 19, 2003 @ 06:44 PM)</div><div class='quotemain'> <!--QuoteBegin-Taelon@Jul 19, 2003 @ 07:02 AM

After all, some of you know me from DC++ where I (used to) hang out day and night and let people download my shared files. Hey, it doesn't hurt to ask.

Have you asked your loyal fans from the hub for donations?

You have my sympathy - losing a drive would suck - but asking for financial assistance?

[/b][/quote]

Some folk have no pride I guess.. Going around begging for cash because your hard drive broke down seems pretty low when there's people starving in the world.

I'm gonna be quiet now before I get more pissed off..

 

[Jurai]

Hopefully you didn't already send your drive off, I would have posted sooner but someone temp nanned me....

I had the exact same problem with a 40gig wd in my other pc (spin up, click, spin up, click... Freeze), eventually windows would list the drive but it was full inaccessible, I was able to recover files using Runtime DiskExplorer, a trial is at www.runtime.org I believe so you can see if it will work or not, the program is pretty advanced so you may need to check the help, basic instructions, run it, first menu, choose drive, wait a min or two it'll appear it froze but its just scanning your bus, now choose your drive, you'll have no clue what its showing you now, anyway now you want 2nd menu I think, Root of drive or somethin, this will present you with a file structure of drive, good luck, pm or aim if you need help