Did your Hard Drive die? Recover that Data! 1

[beauxdean]

Not long ago, a capacitor blew up in my power supply. After putting in a new power supply, I discovered that both my Hard Drives had obviously recieved a blow and were dead. So, I tried an idea that I had. The idea that probably, only the circuit boards were blown and NOT the data.
So, since both were still under warranty, I got in touch with the Manufacturer and, using my credit card, I had them send me 2 new HD's BEFORE I sent the old ones back to them (They'll do this if you have a credit card). As soon as the new drives arrived, I checked to make sure that they were identical to the old ones. They were so I continued my quest which was to take the old circuit boards off the old drives and replace them with the new circuit boards from the new drives. I did. Then I re-installed them in my system and presto! It worked!
I promtly backed up my data to my Jaz drive and then took them back out, switched the circuit boards back around again, installed and dumped the Jaz data back in to the new drives and I'm back in business!
I then sent the old drives back to the factory and they know none the difference....Go Fix It!

 

[hotfusion]

As long as your soldering is as good as theirs! If not, they will notice the tampering and void the warranty. Poopy will hit the rotating blades at high velocity! LOL
Thanks for a good tip though. Andy. My suggestions are what I would try myself. If incorrect, I welcome corrections to my rather limited knowledge. Andy.

 

[iSeriesCodePoet]

For most of the hard drives I have seen, the circut board is not soldered to the housing the the disks, it is just held there by screws and with no warrenty stickers to break what beauxdean would work.

Creative thinking, thanks for the tip! Mike Wills
RPG Programmer

"I am bad at math because God forgot to include math.h into my programming!"

Please let us (Tek-Tips members) know if the solutions I provide are helpful to you. Not only do my posts help you but they may help others.

 

[CitrixEngineer]

Hmm. We can't really condone this sort of thing on a professional forum, can we?

Why not just get the drive fixed/replaced under warranty?


CE

 

[edfair]

I would neither condemn nor condone. That is what it took to do the job. As long as the broken parts were put back on he is within moral and legal responsibilities. Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[beauxdean]

Let me make it clear that it is TOTALLY within moral and legal responsibilities (Thanks Edfair). Anyone responding negatively to this post COULD POSSIBLY be one of those guys who get PAID hundreds of dollars to retrieve data. Since most bad hard drives are the circuit board, this post would be a little threatening to them.....

 

[Sashanan]

The prices that are sometimes charged for data recovery are scandalous. With that in mind, one might ask the question *who* is trespassing moral responsibilities...
"Much that I bound, I could not free. Much that I freed returned to me."
(Lee Wilson Dodd)

 

[edfair]

Look, data recovery is/can be a labor intensive slow process using high priced equipment.
It is also a place where people can get ripped off.
You can't paint every data recovery place as crooks.
If you aren't smart enough to do data backup then you have to pay the price. Hard drives are manufactured to fail. That's why you'll see a MTBF rating, even tho 200K hours is a pipe dream.

Backup means a totally different thing to somebody who has had a hard drive fail. Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[hotfusion]

Yes, I would agree with edfair that data recovery companies can justify their high prices when you consider the environment in which this process takes place i.e. controlled humidity and temp., dust-free, and the highly qualified people they employ. They are in business to make money, after all, not to act as a data recovery charity for those who trust Lady Luck.
But for all that, I wonder what the chances of success would be if one of us was to carefully open a duff drive, remove the platters and place them in another identical case. As long as dust was to a minimum maybe it would work long enough to recover data? It would be interesting to try.
There is, though, no substitute for backing up valuable data. I speak from experience! My suggestions are what I would try myself. If incorrect, I welcome corrections to my rather limited knowledge. Andy.

 

[CitrixEngineer]

More coffee needed.

I clearly did not read your posting properly yesterday, beauxdean. :~/

Having re-read it, I now think you were totally right, within your rights, and that it's a great idea.


hotfusion;

The platters are hermetically sealed in the factory by machines. I don't know of anyone that has sucessfully done this - and don't believe it can be done. beauxdean's process does much the same thing (if I'm reading it correctly this time!).


CE