Will someone please shoot me?

[Steve Maskery]

In an effort to reduce our carbon footprint, I decided, a few months go, not to leave my PC on 24/7. I access it all day and it used to do backups during the night. I started to switch it off when I went to bed.

You are ahead of me.

This evening I was editing some footage when the picture stopped. Just stopped.

I rebooted, no D drive at all (which contains My Documents).

I think I've lost every word, every second of film, every everything that that I've produced since July 9th, and I'm not yet certain that that is restoring OK, I'll know in a couple of hours.

I have a new film clip to release when the next BW goes on sale and I think I have lost all that.

I've lost weeks of edited filming for my next two DVDs. I still have it on tape, but it's weeks of work to re-do it.

How could I be so stupid? I just want to die.

S

 

[wizer]

How are you trying to recover it Steve?

 

[Steve Maskery]

I'm doing a Restore from an external hard drive. The problem is that it is hopelessly OOD.

I suppose there is a slim chance that the problem is with the power to the disk, or some comms or something rather than the disk itself, but I bet I'm clutching at straws.

Disks usually go on startup, don't they? I've never had one go in mid-use.

If I don't post again you know why.

S

 

[andycktm]

No steve you don't............
You tried fdisk at dos prompt?

 

[Steve Maskery]

andy
How does that help?
S

 

[wizer]

Leave fdisk alone!

There are applications that will recover files from failed drives, even drives that bios can not read.

 

[Jamesc]

You have my commiserations, I foe one have been there.

If you can't recover it yourself it may well be worth contacting a professional data recovery service. They can recover data from practically anything and depending on how you value your time could prove cost effective.

Hope you get your work back

Regards

James

 

[Steve Maskery]

Tell me more!
Do I have your phone number?

The worst of it is that I used to be a computer engineer, always nagging customers to keep their BUs up to date.

S

 

[andycktm]

It tells you what drives you have ,i'll leave it in wizers capable hands good luck steve.

 

[mickthetree]

I'm with Wizer on this.

Plenty on apps that can recover files from a failed HDD, even after formatting. Some free, some paid for.

I would suggest you stop everything you are doing (recovery wise) and try to get the files off first.

deleted files are not actually deleted until that portion of the drive is written over. Mearly taken out of the "table of contents" for the drive.

Hope you get it sorted Steve.

 

[RobertMP]

I'd try data recovery software as a first step.

Then there is the freezer trick that some say works and most say doesn't

This guy used to get recommended a lot for recovering from dead hard drives - http://www.retrodata.co.uk/

Good luck.

 

[TonyW]

Do not use FDISK - it may truly F*** your data in this instance! It is meant to be used for creating partitions etc.

Do not attempt to save other data to this drive or try and defrag etc.

You will need to either purchase recovery software as previously stated or go to a commercial enterprise in either case I estimate a minimum cost of £80.

I have used 2 programs in the past R Studio and Stellar Phoenix. You can download demo R studio http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/Bac ... ware.shtml

Stellar Phoenix from http://www.stellarinfo.com/

My pref. R Studio. In either case you will need to put the application onto a different drive to your data and let it run. Unfortunately you will not be allowed to actually recover the data until you purchase the software - but at least it will allow you to see what can be salvaged.

Cheers
Tony
Edit: Just re read your post.
Can you actually see your drive in My Computer or BIOS?
What do you see for drive entries in Device Manager and any yellow exclamation marks?
My worry is that 'restore from another drive' !

 

[wizer]

Sorry Steve I had an early night last night, exhausting day being goaded by bad bad men into buying tools....


I think the others have covered it well. It's been 5 or 6yrs since I last had to do this so I can't recommend a product, but they are out there and work very well. Just read the instructions and be very very careful.

 

[Steve Maskery]

Thanks for the advice and sympathy guys!

OK

My Docs was on Drive D, which is a separate disk in my PC case. It is no longer visible in My Computer or Device Manager. Edit - Nor BIOS.

I have a July 9th backup on an external drive and I've restored this to a new My Docs on Drive C. So I've done nothing at all to Drive D. The Backup has been successful, so I have quite a bit of my bandsaw film, but nothing of the honing jig one for BW14, and there was other stuff on Drive D besides My Docs. So I really would like to get it back.

I've downloaded something called File Scavenger, but that does not see the drive. I've just done the same with R-studio and that doesn't see it either.

I've found a company just a few miles away that claims to do data recovery from HDDs, so I think that is my next port of call.

Cheers
Steve, not feeling quite as suicidal as he did last night.

 

[TonyW]

Glad that you are at least part way there to recovery. Sorry if my warning about Fdisk was a little dramatic - truth is it is unlikely that you would damage your system just by looking for your drive. However the loss of data can be traumatic and lead to mistakes being made by accepting wrong options in menus and making the problem worse (hear speaks someone who has pressed the wrong option button at least once )

Trying the data recovery company may well be your best option. However if you want to investigate a little further yourself first:

1. As neither recovery option can see your device then it is unlikely that it will be seen in Device manager - have you looked to make sure this is the case?

2. Have you checked for the device being recognised in BIOS?
If it is identified are the parameters for the device set manual auto. In the former are the device parameters set correctly for your HDD?

3. Have you checked that power is getting to the HDD?

4. Is the HDD connected to the mobo via its own or shared cable? Is it plugged in correctly? A pretty long shot but if you have a spare cable try swapping.

TBH Like you my experience of disk failure is usually upon start up rather than during use (other than something corrupting the FAT or MBR).

I honestly do not know if any of the above will be of any help.

Best of luck.
Cheers
Tony
EDIT: Dammit missed your edit - too tired this morning!

 

[Jamesc]

Hi Steve,

Sorry for the lateness of my reply, but it seems you have found a local company (always the best) to help out.

I used Norton the authors of the anti-virus. I had to send the disk by their carrier and if I recall the cost was around £200 but this was peanuts compared to what we could have lost.

Good luck again, I hope that sick feeling in the pit of your stomach goes soon.

Regards

James

 

[cutting42]

Hi Steve

My sympathies as we have all had something similar happen I am sure.

Something I would try is to check the "very basics". Open the case and reseat the drive cables on drive D to check it is not a loose connection. If that does not work, unplug the drive, and replace with another drive (if you have one) to check if the PC sees the new HD. This will double check that it is your drive that is faulty, not the PC. Next thing to try would be your D drive in a different PC again to confirm what has failed.

If after this the drive is dead, you should proceed with the other suggestions.

HTH

 

[Vormulac]

Apologies for the egg-sucking lesson here, but have you checked that data cable? I have always had the most appaling luck with SATA cables, the ruddy things just keep dropping out!
Try booting into a Knoppix environment and see if you can access the drive through there instead.
Also, if you do get access to the drive again I have had terrific success recovering files with a program called 'Recuva'.

 

[wizer]

Try booting into a Knoppix environment and see if you can access the drive through there instead.

That's a good idea, didn't think of that. But be careful as linux can be quite unforgiving of 'old fashion' disk partitions.

 

[Steve Maskery]

Yes I did try the cable. It was in firmly, although I didn't have a spare one to swap.

It's currently sitting in a discreet office in darkest Nottinghamshire being Looked At. We'll see. [-o<

S