HDD Failure.. What to do???

[ezekielrage_99]

Sorry this isn't really a Mac question but I've had a HDD failure on my work PC, the drive was a 400GB Western Digital with an NTFS file system that contained mapping data (and yes we didn't back it up...)

The drive itself one morning would keep coming up with the same message "Unmounted disk or Unformatted disk" (well something to that extent) I was wondering what the best course of action is with data recover?

• Basically how much would it cost?
• What would the variation be in cost from a hardware (mechanical, electronic, etc) to a software fault?
• What would the success rate be on recovering the data?
• Anyone recommend a DR place in the Sydney area?

I am in Sydney so a Sydney based Data Recovery place would we good.

Any help would be great... I'm loosing hair from this stress

 

[marykay9507]

The only answer I have for you is the cost is usually quite high-- on a work computer (pc) we unfortunately had a similar issue and had to go through data recovery-- they were successful (luckily because all our client info was on there and like you, we neglected to back anything up-- WE DO NOW!!); cost was over $2000, but completely necessary because we needed all our client info.

 

[ezekielrage_99]

Thanks for your response.

I normally back everything up at least twice (once on a portable HDD and also onto DVD if possible) but this was on a PC with data I hardly ever access and I was also under the impression we had the original CD hanging around the office somewhere (still looking..)

Either way I think this will be a costly SNAFU...

 

[sushi]

Since it is a PC, you might try Spinrite.

It works very well. I have been able to fix Mac and PC hard drives with it.

Small download. Can burn a bootable CD. Works well. Worth the price.

Note, you would DL Spinrite to another PC and then burn the bootable CD, whereby leaving your troubled HD untouched. Spinrite works at a very low level, so it may be able to recover your hard drive.

Of course Spinrite will not work if the hard drive is not spinning up.