Problem with HD

[Nino]

This is the very fist time I had a problem with a hard drive in 20 years, I wonder if anyone has similar problems and how they fix it.

I turned on my Mac this morning and it did not recognized one of the hard drives, the one I needed of course. Usually when I turn on the computers I hear the one time clicking of each drive being engaged, this particular drive keeps on clicking. It’s a Seagate Barracuda 300G, I tried a different power supply but that’s not it.

If anyone has any suggestion before I call Seagate I would really appreciate it.

 

[Canonman]

Nino, my first recommendation would be to obtain a copy of Drive Warrior. It has a pretty good success record. If you have a true hardware failure, nothing short of a trip to a data recovery house will get your stuff back. The latter option is mighty expensive because it often involves removing your disc platters and placing them into another unit which then has to be calibrated to read them.

Hopefully, it's just some formatting info that has become corrupted.

Best of luck,

cm

 

[bluffton]

Nino, I don't want to state the obvious, but here goes. I unplugged a drive from my mac when it was off and didn't realize I didn't eject it. I had issues with that drive until I reformatted later. Yes I even used Disc Warrior. You may only have to trash your "finder" preferences and all may be better. I would start with that before doing anything.

MAC User>Library>Preferences>com.apple.finder.plist

Restart your mac and then empty the trash

Good luck!

 

[Necktie Boy]

If none of that works....pull the drive and tap on it. It may just free it enough to
start spinning again. And if it does spin up, pull the the files off before you shut down the drive.....That method worked at my job with a drive that wouldn't start up. The tapping of the drive got it to alive. Good luck

 

[Nino]

Thanks guys,

I tried all your suggestions and few more things, exorcism is next. Definitely there's something wrong with the drive internally, I can hear a bearing like noises when the drive starts up and when it shuts down. I have a new one on standby in case it decides to show up just long enough to move the files. There's bunch of archives in it so nothing really current. Seagate asks $1700 to $2400 to recover the data, they told me that hard drives can not be repaired, personally I believe that everything can be repaired but if they can get $2400 to recover the data why bother with repairs.

Did anyone here ever took one of those things apart?

 

[BluesCam]

I would not take it apart. It could be a bad drive or it went offline from the OS somehow. Can you run seatools on it? If the drive is dying, you could try taking in out, putting it inside a ziplock bag and putting it in the freezer for several hours. Then try putting it back and see if you can get the data off. If the OS doesn't see it at all, then it may be something other that a bad drive. Try reseating the cabling (scsi, eide etc).

 

[Canonman]

Did anyone here ever took one of those things apart?

Yes, I've had them apart before Nino, but I wouldn't advise that. Hard drives are assembled in a Class 100 clean room. They have to be because the heads are so close to, but not actually touching the surface during operation. Any dust entering the platter area from disassembly would get between heads and disc, thus scratching the delicate plating and definitely making your data unrecoverable.

I'm like you in that I like to fix broken things. My garage could hold its own with Tool Time. But some things honestly do require specialized facilities. Modern hard drives are in that category.

cm

 

[Nino]

Thanks again guys. I'm trying to figure the reasoning to freeze the drive in an attempt to get it working, even temporarily. I imagine as I'm hearing a bearing like noise coming from inside the drive, by freezing it the metal would shrink thus temporarily freeing up the spinning of the discs or long enough to retrieve the data.

Am I off base?

If somebody tried doing this, would you go from the freezer into full operation or let it warm up for awhile.

 

[rocky1138]

it looks like you're on base w/ the freezing of metal parts, this guy tried it & it worked for him

http://geeksaresexy.blogspot.com/2006/01/freeze-your-hard-drive-to-recover-data.html

other than that I'd say look to see if there is a local data recovery in your area. I have a relative who just salvaged hard drive data for less than $200 (if I remember correctly)

if you don't NEED the data check to see what your warranty is, you might be able to get it replaced, or just go out & buy a new one. hard drives are getting cheap & spending 14 hours messing w/ it probably costs you more than working 14 hours & buying a new one

if you do have to buy a new one, my brother who does a lot of web work says Maxtor is the best for customer relations & has replaced things when other companies wouldn't

 

[Canonman]

hard drives are getting cheap & spending 14 hours messing w/ it probably costs you more than working 14 hours & buying a new one

if you do have to buy a new one, my brother who does a lot of web work says Maxtor is the best for customer relations & has replaced things when other companies wouldn't

Especially at Nino's daily rate!

FYI, Seagate and Maxtor are now the same company. The buyout was a year or so ago.

cm

 

[circle7]

freezing worked for me, but I hooked it up cold to a bytecc external controller and put the drive between two freezer packs while I copied the data to another drive. Its worth a try. Good time to start a backup program with one set off site.

 

[SoMissTV]

We've had an ongoing problem with similar symptoms. The drive sounds like it spins up, clicks, spins down; rinse, lather, repeat. It was a bad power supply not sending enough voltage to the six drives in the RAID array. You may want to look at the power coming into the drive.

Good luck!

 

[ontrackp]

Nino,
I am sorry to hear about your trouble with the drive. I have seen this happen many times as some of my projects have been very drive intensive (20+ drives). Try changing the orientation of the drive -- if you normally have it horizontal sitting on it's little feet, put it up on it's side (I got this advice for a technician at Tekserve once). Or even upside down. No matter what have another drive online to copy your data just in case it works one more time.

If you are using more than one drive in a chain, try changing the order of the drives. Try connecting with the other type of Firewire - if you're using 800 try 400 (this probalby won't make a difference but it's worth trying everything)

Unfortunately, once you start hearing clicking noises it's usually over for that drive, and data recovery is really expensive -- the last time we had one of these we were quoted $1200 to take the data off a 500Gig.

We once solved a similar drive issue by replacing power switches -- this was on G-Tech 500Gig drives.

My last piece of advice is even if you get it working again, you should just get the data off it and retire it into the garbage pail. Once a drive starts failing it never, ever justs gets well again.

Good luck.