Clicking Drive Fix ?

thedoc46 · 22 Mar 2011 at 23:03

A dear friend of my missus had an external USB drive that was no longer being detected and upon plug in, it was just clicking away in a 'I'm screwed' way.. Girl was nearly in tears saying that it had all her work from god knows when and all the pics of her kids on it. I basically told her the way I thought it was and that was, "hey sorry, I can't help you. You need a data recovery specialist."

Anyway low and behold she took it into a local comp shop and they somehow managed to get it going again for not a lot of money. So they clearly didn't spend a lot of time on the issue.

I now feel a little stupid for not getting her sorted. My missus is chewing my ears off too, cos she said to her friend really needed the help and i failed to give it. :rolleyes:

Just interested to hear, what do you think they done to fix a clicking drive?

I mean am I missing something here? I've heard of the freezer trick, but my understanding was if it's clicking away in a repetitive way, then you up the creek so to speak.. Well aparently not !!!

Any idea's.

Kotu · 22 Mar 2011 at 23:14

think you can get replacement controller boards online for much cheaper than recovery services are, or if its a fairly new drive you can just buy another with the same firmware version and swap the boards on those instead.

Obviously this won't always fix it, for example if its a mechanical failure then it would require servicing in a clean room.

It could just be that the computer shop got lucky and it was one of the more simple problems to fix.

CaptainCrash · 22 Mar 2011 at 23:18

If it makes you feel better, I can guarantee you that professional data recovery firms don't put HDDs in freezers - it's just a shot to nothing when there's nothing to lose, and even when people report apparent success I'm not convinced it's anything more than coincidence in most cases.

As for what they actually did, who knows... maybe simply plugging it directly into your motherboard may have worked, or if you'd tried it you may have made things worse. At least you didn't get the blame for destroying all her data irretrievably, or landing her with a four-figure recovery bill - in fact, I think you did the wisest thing under the circumstances, and given the happy ending I think your other half is being a little unfair.

thedoc46 · 23 Mar 2011 at 16:21

So what are some of the 'simplier' methods they would have used? i may as well get to grips with some of those for the next time I have a girl crying on my shoulder. Isn't there some kind of low level checking type of software? Or perhaps is there a special device they can plug into? I just dunno.

Boozebeard · 23 Mar 2011 at 16:25

I don't know how anyone can be angry at you if you don't even know how they could have possibly fixed it. Sounds like you did the right thing to me.

KIA · 23 Mar 2011 at 16:30

First step = remove drive from enclosure and connect to motherboard.

thedoc46 · 23 Mar 2011 at 18:38

fluff said:
First step = remove drive from enclosure and connect to motherboard.

I know, but given the fact it was clicking away in a repetitive way, I said to myself why bother. If there was no clicking I can tell you 100% this would have been my next step...