silverfool Posted October 15, 2008 Share Posted October 15, 2008 like the title says, a friend of mine had a hard drive failure and there was unfortunately, one important excel file which he failed to back-up elsewhere. so needless to say, he needs to get it back. the drive failed to boot when powered up. he's more computer savvy then I am so I imagine he's already check the basics (i.e. power source). anyone know much about data recovery? more importantly, anything in the OC/LA area? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paradiso Posted October 15, 2008 Share Posted October 15, 2008 If it's a boot issue only then he can get a new drive and load an OS, plug the old drive in as a slave drive. If he's lucky the data will still be accessible. If he's computer savy then he's already thought of this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaptan Posted October 15, 2008 Share Posted October 15, 2008 Has he tried booting with a Linux CD, like Knoppix, and using a USB thumb drive to back up the file? Or, like Paradiso said, connect the hard drive as a slave in a bootable PC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seanlsb Posted October 15, 2008 Share Posted October 15, 2008 Professional data recovery is typically expensive and without guarantee. I contracted the service several times (mind you this was years ago) and it reached as much as $800/gb - all depended on the level of fail. If there's any mechanical sounding noise, chances that the platters are toast is pretty good. If it just seems to be spinning quietly and not seeking - or seeking aimlessly - I've heard of a few good options. First, I've heard a computer nerd's version of a wives tale that if you put it in the freezer for a couple hours, you might get one last boot. Also, buying an identical drive (ebay) and swapping out the pcb board is a pretty cheap and reasonable option. It's an easy swap, and that board often contains the failed component. Make sure you're keeping in mind how much time it takes for your friend to recreate this file, and spend no more than 25% of that time trying to recover it. That's my rule of thumb, anyway. Also, I've found that most computer issues are karmic in nature; if all else fails, try going out and doing a good deed and then come back and try again. Best of luck to you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FishingFiend Posted October 15, 2008 Share Posted October 15, 2008 +1 for the freezer tip. If it's mechanical failure, it may work. I was able to recover data from an old IBM drive this way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MiniStiGuy Posted October 16, 2008 Share Posted October 16, 2008 Having personally done the freezer a few times I will attest that it does work. my damn sisters external would stop responding once it got to hot. To get her data off I surrounded it with ice packs (its aluminum cased) and it worked like a champ. OEM HID's Rx330 Retro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evan Posted October 16, 2008 Share Posted October 16, 2008 I've used Ontrack Data Recovery before: http://buyonline.ontrack.com/ecom/catalog.asp?cookie_test=1 The cheapest option they have is their data recovery software that allows you to recover 25 files for $89. It goes up from there. They also do remote sessions where they'll jump on your computer and recover for you, or you can send the drive in to them. Sending the drive in runs $100 for them to look at it and they'll give you a report of what they can recover. If you have them recover anything, the minimum is in the $500-$800 range. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MiniStiGuy Posted October 16, 2008 Share Posted October 16, 2008 luckly you live in socal so there is a lot of us technicians around. OEM HID's Rx330 Retro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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