Spinrite in use...NOT

[laurierobey]

Let's see if this can recover my HD long enough to gt the computer to boot again...

Ok, Spinrite isn't going to be able to recover my HD. Critical error it can't recover from. I think my HD is completely toasted.

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Comments

[jamesb]

If you can get the hard drive out, try putting it in a zip-lock baggy and sticking it into the freezer for a few hours. I've had a reasonable amount of success retrieving data from failing hard drives by chilling the drive and then running it while sandwiched between two cold packs. I even had a set of extended HDD data and power cables that would let me run the drive while still in the freezer so I had time to let Ghost clone the drive.

[laurie-robey.livejournal.com]

Heh, never heard of that trick before. It's worth a shot!

[jamesb]

Most hard drives these days have internal temperature sensors and many failing drives are simply shutting themselves down due to an "over temperature" trip point being reached. Some HDD diagnostic software will read the temperature sensor.

A lot of laptop hard drives (and desk top hard drives) are installed upside down. They tend wear out bearing surfaces that are intended to be loaded in a different plane than the one the laptop/computer manufacturer has used (often purely for packing reasons). The worn bearing surface means the motor needs extra power to keep the platters spinning at the correct speed, and this tends to cook the drive.

After the first couple of days of hot weather, there's usually an avalanche of failed or failing hard drives due to the over temperature alarm tripping.

[kamau-d-lyon.livejournal.com]

Doesn't sound promising. Here's hoping anything important is on a backup. Oh and hopefully not on a Cloud backup server that's off line because of the power outages.

[laurie-robey.livejournal.com]

Yeah all my data files are backed up, so just have to deal with the pogram files and configuration.