Recovering data from external USB drives

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waynefj40

n00b
Joined
May 21, 2005
Messages
18
Has anybody had the unfortunate experience of backing up important files onto a brand new USB/Firewire HDD only to have it poop out 2 months down the road?

I've got all my data on this 250GB Lacie USB2 (designed by Porsche).
After ejecting the drive, every time I powered down the drive by using the switch in the back, it made an odd high pitched scratching noise. My drive still worked, but that sound always made cross my fingers - hoping it was not coming from the HDD itself, but rather the internal cooling fan powering down.

Now I today I go to plug the drive in and it says it has not been formatted?? What?
It came pre-formatted FAT32 when I got it. I have tried the following programs with no success:

Recover My Files
Get Data Back
Rescue Pro

If you know of a good way to retrieve data from an external USB disk that seems to need formatting, and you know it was -- feel free to share your experience and any tools you used to get back in the game.

t[H]anks,

sorry for my n00Bness. :)
 
I've always had good luck with phoenix fat & ntfs http://www.stellarinfo.com/
Not cheap but the demo will perform a scan and give you a loose indication of what can be recovered before you buy it.

Assuming that these data recovery programs function similarly (because I have not used any of the ones you listed), were you able to scan the drive with no results or would the apps not even see the it?

If its the latter I'd probably crack into the case, likely voiding the warrantly :D , and hook the drive up internally just to rule out the housing... thats also assuming this was data that could not be lost. Otherwise RMA if its only 2 months old.
 
Try taking the drive out of the USB enclosure and plug it directly into the IDE channel. Sometimes those USB controllers get whacky and screw everything up. Seen it happen.
 
Eickst said:
Try taking the drive out of the USB enclosure and plug it directly into the IDE channel. Sometimes those USB controllers get whacky and screw everything up. Seen it happen.
Click to expand...

Good advice. But before you do that, when you open up the enclosure, check the tightness of the connections. I had one come loose and thought my drive was going bad.
 
Slight h/j
Anyone know how to open a Maxtor 5000DV?
mines gona and given me a "drive is not formatted" after i had to hard reset (drive wasnt in use)
 
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