Since alot of folks ask PC questions on TB, I thought I'd add this.
My hard drive crashed on Tuesday, and I finally retrieved the data from it today. I was inches away from putting the hard drive in the freezer to see if I can retrieve something from it. But luckily, someone at the office had a copy of OnTrack EasyRecovery that saved my arse.
I know I should have made backups, and I did. Unfortunately they were done in December, and a lot has gone on since then. Now, I'm considering a RAID configuration to save my data. I'm also going away from little Biostar IDEQ case I was using, and going back to a standard mid-tower. I think the heat build up in the case led to the failure. Couple in the fact that I have a Prescott CPU that seems to love to run hot.
Here's lessons learned that I'd like to share:
1) MAKE REGULAR BACKUPS!!!!! If you're using windows, that includes a recovery diskette.
2) The Knoppix Linux Distro is great in that it can read windows partitions, and runs entirely on CD Rom.
3) BartPE is a great app that will run a mini windows environment off the CD ROM.
4) Things run much faster if you slave the bad drive on a functioning system, rather than working through DOS on your failed system. DOS is awful for memory management. CHKDSK can take days to run if you have a huge drive.
5) If traditional methods of recovery don't work, I suggest OnTrack EasyRecovery or Stellar Phoenix for recovering files. SpinRite might work, but it just takes so d@mn long to do it's thing.
6) If all else fails, many techs have suggested putting the hard drive in a zip-lock bag and then putting it in the freezer for a couple of hours. Take it out, and immediately hook it up to the PC. I don't know the physics of it, but many times it will let a HD run long enough to copy files from it.
Now it's time to build a new PC. This time I'm adding a bunch of fans to the case.
My hard drive crashed on Tuesday, and I finally retrieved the data from it today. I was inches away from putting the hard drive in the freezer to see if I can retrieve something from it. But luckily, someone at the office had a copy of OnTrack EasyRecovery that saved my arse.
I know I should have made backups, and I did. Unfortunately they were done in December, and a lot has gone on since then. Now, I'm considering a RAID configuration to save my data. I'm also going away from little Biostar IDEQ case I was using, and going back to a standard mid-tower. I think the heat build up in the case led to the failure. Couple in the fact that I have a Prescott CPU that seems to love to run hot.
Here's lessons learned that I'd like to share:
1) MAKE REGULAR BACKUPS!!!!! If you're using windows, that includes a recovery diskette.
2) The Knoppix Linux Distro is great in that it can read windows partitions, and runs entirely on CD Rom.
3) BartPE is a great app that will run a mini windows environment off the CD ROM.
4) Things run much faster if you slave the bad drive on a functioning system, rather than working through DOS on your failed system. DOS is awful for memory management. CHKDSK can take days to run if you have a huge drive.
5) If traditional methods of recovery don't work, I suggest OnTrack EasyRecovery or Stellar Phoenix for recovering files. SpinRite might work, but it just takes so d@mn long to do it's thing.
6) If all else fails, many techs have suggested putting the hard drive in a zip-lock bag and then putting it in the freezer for a couple of hours. Take it out, and immediately hook it up to the PC. I don't know the physics of it, but many times it will let a HD run long enough to copy files from it.
Now it's time to build a new PC. This time I'm adding a bunch of fans to the case.
)
