Computer Questions

Dr. Hobo · Post by **Dr. Hobo** » 12/4/2007, 9:39 am

do you have a desktop or a laptop? also the drive a normal internal drive in an external case or is it a store bought external?

if its one of them normal internal drives (3.5" types) they are prone to severe probs w/ bumping and what not.. my bro fried a drive that way and all he did was put it in his bag and put that in the car in the back seat and we drove home... by the time we got home it was dead and its not like the I95 is unpaved and full of potholes or anything either haha

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/4/2007, 5:28 pm

My backup drive that came in the mail is an external drive. The one in need of rescuing is just your regular, run of the mill, internal drive.

Kicker774 · Post by **Kicker774** » 12/4/2007, 5:59 pm

Do you know if the drive is being recognized by your computer?

Just not booting into windows?

You could hook it up as a slave drive or place it in an external USB case and see if you can access your data that way.

Do you hear the drive spin up?
If not a gentle but firm tap to it when your PC is booting up could get it spun up again.

Is it making any clicking noises? If so that's also a bad sign. Power off and power back on coninually and you might get a shot at it spinning up correctly. If doesn't work after 10 tries max, you should stop this before you damage anything further.

Last resort place the drive in a waterproof ziplock bag and place it in the freezer for a few hours. Take it out, let it warm back up to room temperature and give it another try.

Obviously if you do get the drive working again with any of the above solutions get your most important data off the drive asap. Don't just say "Oh great it's working now" because it could soon start clicking again very soon.

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/4/2007, 6:38 pm

So should I follow these directions in order?

Here is what happens: I boot up (the drive is a secondary drive that does not have the OS on it) and it recognizes it. At least I can see it in Windows Explorer. But when I try to open it, it says that the disc needs to be reformatted. I don't see how it can be both!!!

Kicker774 · Post by **Kicker774** » 12/4/2007, 7:01 pm

Ick not cool.

So it does sound like the drive is in operating condition for the most part. Usually half the battle is just getting the system to recognize it.

See if you can go into a command promt (Start -> Run -> cmd)
Then see if you can select your 2nd drive there by typing in 'D:' or 'E:'
If you don't get any errors type in 'DIR' to see if it recognizes the data there then use 'COPY' to copy data to your main drive.

You can also run a 'chkdsk' command on your second drive and see if it'll find and fix any errors.

You can try putting in in your external drive case and see if that results in anything.

Otherwise try putting the drive in another system. Theres a small chance it could be something funky with your existing OS. Another XP or even a Win2000 system might recognize it.

If you have a way to boot directly into DOS and bypass windows you could try that as well.

Another shot would be if you had another spare drive (Or if you can borrow somones spare uneeded drive) you can use a program called Ghost to make an exact duplicate copy of the drive.

There may be more tips/tricks out there but if none of this works your chances of recovering the data look slim.

Feel free to ask if you need further details/clarification on any if the above.

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/4/2007, 7:05 pm

Hm there is a bunch of things there I will try. I did try doing the chkdsk business and it doesn't do that.

Thanks for your help I will let you guys know if any of this stuff works...

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/4/2007, 8:13 pm

So it's definitely NOT clicking. My fan is so loud that I can't really tell if it is spinning or not. If I put my hand under it seems like it is.

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/4/2007, 11:12 pm

Oh my gosh I have learned my lesson I will never, ever, ever again go without backing up. It's transferring now after much tapping and caressing....let's hope it actually works.

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/5/2007, 12:36 am

Guys, guys, I got it! It's backed up! Now I want to back up again...how do you guys do it? I don't want this to happen again.

Kicker774 · Post by **Kicker774** » 12/5/2007, 8:16 am

Awsome!

Do you know how many gigs of stuff you have?

You can always back up your stuff to DVD if you have a burner. (You can buy them for less than $50)

Otherwise my method just involes a spare hard drive that do a complete back up to once a month or so.

You can also check to see if the drive is under warranty. If so send it back and get a new one.

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/5/2007, 11:31 pm

I maxed out the old drive....so 120 gigs.

Dr. Hobo · Post by **Dr. Hobo** » 12/6/2007, 2:18 am

unfortunately its a bit late at the moment for black friday sales but drives are getting really cheap so if you could always just wait for a sale and get a new one as well.. my folks picked up a 500 gb drive for me for ummm 80 bucks during the sales so that works out to 16 cents a gig.. man i remember a time when a buck a gig was considered decent and when i bought my 80 gig drive for 60 bucks that was practically a steal at 75 cents :lol:

Henrietta · Post by **Henrietta** » 12/6/2007, 9:08 am

I got this drive from Newegg. I think it is 500 gigs.

Kicker774 · Post by **Kicker774** » 12/6/2007, 9:35 am

Henrietta wrote:I maxed out the old drive....so 120 gigs.

Ah so thats only 27 some DVDs to backup to.

You could get a blu-ray disc burner and cut that down to like 5 discs.
But I think HD's are cheaper than blu-ray burners.

So yea 2nd HD would be the way to go

Johnny · Post by **Johnny** » 12/6/2007, 9:50 am

How can I attach my laptop to my tv? I have a PAL dvd that I want to watch on my big screen but I can't. So I figure that I can watch it on my tv, through my notebook.

Kicker774 · Post by **Kicker774** » 12/6/2007, 9:55 am

Do you have S-video out on your laptop?

S-video in on your TV?
Some TVs even have VGA-in now if it's newer.

Johnny · Post by **Johnny** » 12/6/2007, 12:48 pm

Well, my tv can support a conncetion from my notebook, but I don't know if my notebook has one of those svideo doohickeys that you speak of.

Dr. Hobo · Post by **Dr. Hobo** » 12/6/2007, 12:57 pm

if it has vga out then you can get a vga to s-video dongle as well

Johnny · Post by **Johnny** » 12/6/2007, 8:56 pm

Vga?

You be usin' words beyond my comprehension!

Kicker774 · Post by **Kicker774** » 12/6/2007, 9:09 pm

D-Sub, 15 Pin Connector, IEEE248.5b, external monitor plug