HDD experiencing clicking, is it really over? Can it be salvaged

If the drive is at all readable I would have tried to make a bit for bit copy of the drive using ddrescue (available on most linux live iso) then used recovery software on the images.

https://www.linux.com/learn/intro-to-linux/2017/3/gnu-ddrescue-best-damaged-drive-rescue


There's no way to save an image of it at this point.
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Although if it after powering up it just clicks for a few seconds then goes undetected (and / or spins down) it is highly likely a problem that no software can fix. In this case I expect at least 1 head is damaged and possibly that the drive can not read the firmware that is on the platter.


If the data has high value, spend the money to have it recovered.
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Agreed.
 
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He has access to it, and he made an image...

Jon1962 said:
What basically happened was that I sent my HDD to a company in Australia, they managed to refurbish the platter, and did a head swap to read parts of the platter that was not damaged. Apparently there are 2 platters in total (4 surfaces) and one of the surface had a very small scratch on the outer rims.
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Dear bros, the recovery centre mentioned that despite it having a scratched platter, they were able to image the HDD but is unable to decipher the data. They said they needed to find an algorithm to translate the data so that it can all be accessed. What can be done?
 
No it wasnt, Nenu but it was scratched, and the scratched occurred in the firmware area
 
Seems odd they dont have this information to hand.
Ask how long before they expect to move on with it.
 
Depends how they do it and what is wrong.
Ask them.
 
In your original post, you mentioned lost family memories. If these are mostly pictures, have them recover those file types first. Same for written documents. You probably don't need to recover the many gigs of Windows OS and other system files or program executables. Without the directory structure, the recovered files will likely have names like img0001, doc002345, etc. You will get all of the image files, including a lot of browser cache and such so expect have to do an eyes on search to recover and rename files you wish to save. And deal with the NSFW files in the browser cache(s).
 
All depends on where the damage is versus the file chunks. You can probably expect some missing parts of some of the videos.
 
sorry to bring my thread up again as I have some queries to check with you brothers here.

The DR firm managed to image my drive but the result is in raw data form and is not readable as the files are all messed up. They said they are unable to read the data properly. Is there any recommendations anyone can make? Thank you once again for any advice. if it helps, my file format is in NTFS.
 
I think you are out of luck. If you have the original disk you could send it to a different company and see if they can properly image it. I wouldn't have a lot of hope for success at this point.
 
drescherjm said:
I think you are out of luck. If you have the original disk you could send it to a different company and see if they can properly image it. I wouldn't have a lot of hope for success at this point.
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what about if i were to pass the raw dump image together with the original disk? Would it help
 
Can my HDD be saved? Right now it is imaged out but they are having difficulties extracting the data. Can anyone help or recommend someone?
 
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