Dead hard disk?

id_wright · 21 Jun 2009 at 09:56

Was playing GTA last night when the game froze, nothing seemed to happen so I rebooted. Posts fine, but when the hard disk would normally spin up and boot into Windows I'm just getting an ominous clicking sound. Still appears as normal in bios.
So, dead disk?
Really hope not as I didn't have enough of it backed up...
Anything I can try?

miniyazz · 21 Jun 2009 at 10:27

Double wrap it in freezelr bags and put it in the freezer for a few hours. Preferably have another system booted up with AHCI enabled and plug it straight in and start copying stuff off, otherwise stick it in your pc and boot up and copy stuff off asap. It often gives you a short while to get stuff off.

id_wright · 21 Jun 2009 at 10:43

What does AHCI mean sorry?
I've disconnected the disck, and attached an old hard disk that I'd never quite got round to removing from my case.
This has allowed me into Windows XP. After cooling, should I then attach the suspect drive as a secondary hard disk? Do I then just set to boot from the xp disk in bios?
Thanks for the reply

miniyazz · 22 Jun 2009 at 02:11

AHCI is a feature of SATA that enables plug and play, otherwise you'll have to boot the system with the HDD in. AHCI being enabled means you can hotplug it in while WinXP is all booted up and ready to retrieve files. It's quite a hassle to enable if not already enabled, especially with older OSs, there'll be a registry value to change etc etc, google it if you want to give enabling it a try. Otherwise freezer bag it, wait til it's nice and cold, plug it back in, boot the system from tother disk, and retrieve files while you can, if it lets you at all (no guarantee).

Edit: so yes, attach the dodgy HDD as a secondary disk. Probably best to press F8 or whatever it is on bootup to bring up boot selection prompt, the BIOS might do funny things and change your boot order around when you plug the dodgy HDD back in.

id_wright · 22 Jun 2009 at 08:47

Thanks for the reply. I booted it as a secondary disk and it allowed me full access to all my data, so that's all safe now. Currently running Seagate's diagnostics (which it is failing) before I contact them for a warranty replacement.
Thanks for the help.