Can this HDD be saved?

Z

Zer0Cool

Limp Gawd
Joined
Apr 4, 2008
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My next door neighbor gave me his PC, to see if I can fix it.

I think he might of burned his MOBO or something, because I cant to seem to get it powered up. I had already told him that, and he asked me if his HDD can be saved, like to get all the important information out.

If I would to take out his HDD and connected it to my PC using eSATA connection, will I be able to access it, and perhaps transfer some files over?
 
Well I ran into some trouble...

The HDD is an IDE ops. I was able to connected it to my MOBO...etc

When I get into windows and go gto my PC the HDD is not there.... What do I do?

My main PC is using a raid-0 and a single HDD for movie storage...etc, I see them both, but dont see my neighbors HDD.

Please help :)
 
Open up the Control Panel, go into Administrative Tools, and choose Computer Management. (If you're using either Windows 7 or Vista, you may be hit with a UAC warning screen. In that case, right click on Computer Management and select "Run as Administrator".) You should see a "tab" that says Disk Management; if that's not available, double-click on Storage (in the main window) and then choose Disk Management.

Upon opening the Disk Management menu, you should be able to view all of the HDDs attached to your system, as well as all of the partition each HDD has. If your neighbor's IDE HDD isn't visible, that means that you may have to "activate" it, and that requires a reformat.
 
Check the jumpers on the HDD. Master/slave conflicts can cause windows to have issues recognizing the drive, despite the fact that the BIOS may be able to detect that it's there.

If the drive is listed in the disk management, but the drive is not listed as active, and requests a format, you can still use data recovery software to pull stuff off the drive.

Assuming the disk can physically spin up ok, and assuming the PCB on the drive is not shot, there shouldn't be any trouble with getting data from it.
 
tiraides said:
Open up the Control Panel, go into Administrative Tools, and choose Computer Management. (If you're using either Windows 7 or Vista, you may be hit with a UAC warning screen. In that case, right click on Computer Management and select "Run as Administrator".) You should see a "tab" that says Disk Management; if that's not available, double-click on Storage (in the main window) and then choose Disk Management.

Upon opening the Disk Management menu, you should be able to view all of the HDDs attached to your system, as well as all of the partition each HDD has. If your neighbor's IDE HDD isn't visible, that means that you may have to "activate" it, and that requires a reformat.
Click to expand...



I did everything as you sad, very easy to navigate, thanks.

Unfortunately the IDE HDD is not there.... :(

Is there an on/off switch in BIOS for the IDE connection, maybe its off? I looked in BIOS and I cant see the IDE HDD there... I looked for the on/off option and dont think it there either.

You sad I might need to format it, how? if I cant even see it. (But format is out of the question here, he was specific not to format it lol)

Anything else we can do here?

Thanks
 
If it's not listing in the BIOS, then either:

1) HDD jumper issue
2) IDE/RAID BIOS setting issue
3) PCB dead issue

And again, the format thing is not really a concern. Formats are not data destructive and can be undone. If the drive is functional enough to be formatted, it's also going to be functional enough to be recovered.
 
hughJ said:
If it's not listing in the BIOS, then either:

1) HDD jumper issue
2) IDE/RAID BIOS setting issue
3) PCB dead issue

And again, the format thing is not really a concern. Formats are not data destructive and can be undone. If the drive is functional enough to be formatted, it's also going to be functional enough to be recovered.
Click to expand...


I looked around the house to try and find more IDE devices to see if I can test them out, but unfortunately I dont think I have any...

There are no jumpers on the IDE HDD, and according to the label on the HDD that means "Single or Master"

I can hear the HDD working, so there is power there, but who knowns it might be dead on in the inside.

Anything else we can do here to trouble shoot this thing?
 
If there is no jumper on the IDE HDD, it goes to "Cable Select" mode where it becomes a Master or Slave drive based on which part of the IDE cable it's connected to. Connect the IDE HDD to the uppermost part of the IDE cable, restart your computer and access your BIOS. (The following is a bit sketchy; without knowing which particular board/BIOS you're using, I'm only guessing where all of the menus are located. The following is based off the Phoenix - Award BIOS configuration.)

Once in the BIOS, select Standard CMOS Features (or the first choice on the left column of menu choices). You should be able to see all of the drives connected to your computer. If you don't see the serial number of the IDE HDD listed, go back to the main menu and select Integrated Peripherals. Search for something listed as "IDE Device" or "IDE Controller" (or something similar) and select that menu. The BIOS should have some text on the right-hand side that would help you navigate through that section, but the long story short is that the IDE controller needs to be activated and set to "IDE Mode" (or something similar).

Your motheboard's user manual (which can also be found online) has more detailed instructions for navigating through the BIOS.
 
I hear what you saying tiraides, but if I understood you correct If i set it to ""IDE Mode" I will not be able to boot into windows since im using "raid mode".

I will go into bios and double check what you just mentioned, but I already tried the ""IDE Mode" and when I restarted it told me that "No operating system is installed" All i could do there is press alt ctrl delete for restart of the PC.

Im going to see my neighbor now, so il brb in like 20-30 min, and check the bios settings once again.
 
Crap, I forgot about your RAID array. Don't switch anything.

Outside of trying the HDD in another system -- or, if you have one, an external enclosure -- I don't know of any other troubleshooting steps you could take.
 
tiraides said:
Crap, I forgot about your RAID array. Don't switch anything.

Outside of trying the HDD in another system -- or, if you have one, an external enclosure -- I don't know of any other troubleshooting steps you could take.
Click to expand...

I truly appreciate all ur help there man, thank you.

Funny that you mentioned the external enclosures, I bought this "Thermaltake BlacX Duet ABS" dock, to give my brother as a Christmas gift the WS Black 1TB HDD, thinking that I might be able to use it to get this hdd working, but I was retarded not to check the HDD first for connection. Cant use IDE HDD's on that one, but my bro sure loved the gift. :)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817153112

However I have an older enclosure that I use for the last 4 years to store all my data on, going need to check if its IDE completable.

Unfortunately trying the HDD on the other system is out of the questions, lets just hope the enclosure works :)
 
UPDATE:

Here is what I was able to get. I connected it to my external enclosure, and was able to get Computer management, as well as my computer to see, but just for a second, then it went away and I got a pop telling me to reformat the HDD.

Well the good news that its not dead, the bad news I have no idea what to do next. Whats the next step, or is this it :(

The other question I have, why didnt I get this pop up when I was connecting it to my MOBO? Maybe this IDE HDD, need to be connected once in windows for it to be recognized? I doubt its my MOBO...
 
I don't know what else to tell you, except that the IDE HDD is likely on its last legs. If you could access the HDD using the external HDD, I'd recommend that you try to extract as much from the drive as possible. (I know, it's a big "if.")
 
When I sad access the HDD I mean all I get is a msg asking me if I want to reformat it or not, I cant even see in the Computer manager, so I dont think there is much I can do with ought wiping all the info.

Well this was a good try I think :)
 
Zer0Cool said:
When I sad access the HDD I mean all I get is a msg asking me if I want to reformat it or not, I cant even see in the Computer manager, so I dont think there is much I can do with ought wiping all the info.

Well this was a good try I think :)
Click to expand...

You may be able to get the data back using a data recovery tool. When the filesystem is damaged such tools can work around the damage and retrieve anything they find.
 
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