Dead, dead, dead. It's dead. (external hard drive): This was discussed recently; I thought I had saved the thread but I have searched and not been able to find it. I seem to recall a...

DJO

This was discussed recently; I thought I had saved the thread but I have searched and not been able to find it.

I seem to recall a discussion where several UHH members were able to bring non-functioning external hard drives back to life, many using the same method.

I'm not sure if I need miracle or not. I have a (very old) LaCie 200mb external hard drive, once attached to an i-mac, now functioning as a paper weight. If possible I'd like to retrieve its content. Thank you.

Dngallagher Loc: Wilmington De.

DJO wrote:

This was discussed recently; I thought I had saved the thread but I have searched and not been able to find it.

I seem to recall a discussion where several UHH members were able to bring non-functioning external hard drives back to life, many using the same method.

I'm not sure if I need miracle or not. I have a (very old) LaCie 200mb external hard drive, once attached to an i-mac, now functioning as a paper weight. If possible I'd like to retrieve its content. Thank you.

Most if not all external drives are a combination of case, power supply, circuit board and a SATA or IDE drive depending on the age. If you open the case, the drive should be removable and if the problem is the circuit board or power supply then you may be able to connect it to another docking station (case) and it may be useable.

For example : I have several drives connected to my Mac with various docking stations - USB, Firewire and Thunderbolt, however all the drives are really SATA drives that could be moved to any docking station and connected to the Mac.

LoneRangeFinder Loc: Left field

DJO wrote:

This was discussed recently; I thought I had saved the thread but I have searched and not been able to find it.

I seem to recall a discussion where several UHH members were able to bring non-functioning external hard drives back to life, many using the same method.

I'm not sure if I need miracle or not. I have a (very old) LaCie 200mb external hard drive, once attached to an i-mac, now functioning as a paper weight. If possible I'd like to retrieve its content. Thank you.

It likely wouldn't be a DIY project--because it's not my area of expertise. I recently had a PC die. Couldn't open squat.
I took it in and they were able to retrieve/save all of the photos to an external hard drive.

I've not had this happen with my MAC, but I do monthly updates using TimeMachine, and bi-monthly updates on my image files.

blackest Loc: Ireland

if it really is 200mb and not 200gb then its likely to be a pata / ata drive. you can still get adapters for them but probably not locally.

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

http://www.google.com/search?q=bring+non-functioning+external+hard+drives+back+to+life&oq=bring+non-functioning+external+hard+drives+back+to+life&aqs=chrome..69i57&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=93&ie=UTF-8

Indi Loc: L. I., NY, Palm Beach Cty when it's cold.

You really don't need to put it in an enclosure or dock. You can buy a connector that will connect to almost any hard drive to your computer via USB. No need to spend a lot of money for an old 200 MB hard drive.
If it works, you should be able to see and copy whatever is on that drive.

blackest Loc: Ireland

Indi wrote:

You really don't need to put it in an enclosure or dock. You can buy a connector that will connect to almost any hard drive to your computer via USB. No need to spend a lot of money for an old 200 MB hard drive.
If it works, you should be able to see and copy whatever is on that drive.

If it is a sata drive then a desktop system will be able to connect to it with a sata cable internally, if its pata/ide 3.5 inch then that will be possible too with an ide cable. if its ide/pata and 2.5 inch you would need an adapter as a 2.5 ide uses a 44pin connector with power built in, while the desktop drive is 40 pin and separate power. There is also a chance it could be a scsi or sas drive, that could be tricky, unlikely though.

If the desktop system runs windows it isn't going to read hfs+ file system by default, however paragon do a hfs driver for windows, a linux system has hfs available for free anyway.

So two stages really, identify which type of drive it is inside the external case. then find a machine to connect it to , preferably a mac.

If that sounds like greek, then it might be best to go to a genius bar or a computer repair place that know mac's.

Bobbee

I remember reading the post you are referring to. From a vauge memory, I thought someone said to put it in the frig, maybe freezer. Pull it out, plug it in and you will get a few minutes from it. Of course the issue was specific. Don't know what your is.

bcmink Loc: Monona, WI

Remove the raw drive from LaCie external case and place the drive in a compatible external docking station (PATA, SATA, IDE) that you know is functioning.

Here is a guide to identifying drive type by connector: http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/Other/2579-001151.pdf

Alternatively you can connect the raw LaCie drive to an open bay in a desktop computer, again paying attention to the drive type. Most desktops will have SATA and IDE motherboard headers.

The most common failure mode for external hard drives is a bad power supply or malfunctioning USB to PATA/SATA/IDE translation circuit.

wmontgomery Loc: Louisiana

DJO wrote:

This was discussed recently; I thought I had saved the thread but I have searched and not been able to find it.

I seem to recall a discussion where several UHH members were able to bring non-functioning external hard drives back to life, many using the same method.

I'm not sure if I need miracle or not. I have a (very old) LaCie 200mb external hard drive, once attached to an i-mac, now functioning as a paper weight. If possible I'd like to retrieve its content. Thank you.

If you can hear the drive spinning, try SpinRite by Gibson Research (grc.com). Will need a Windows machine to run the program on. Money back no question guarantee ($80). Follow instructions which include burning a boot CD. Attach LaCie external, boot Windows machine with SpinRite CD, select drive, use option 2.
Most drives it will process in less than a day; I have had it run for a month. I am currently running it on a 320GB drive. It has run 158 hrs and completely recovered all the data on 6 bad sectors; 53% finished.
Great product that I have used 10 years.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Opening an external drive's case is no big deal. I've done it many times. There are probably small screws somewhere, maybe under the rubber feet. The old drive will come right out.

I have several different ways to connect a bare external to a computer, either a couple of wires or a stand-alone case that the drive slides into. Take a look here.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_c_0_27?url=search-alias%3Dcomputers&field-keywords=hard+drive+external+adapter&sprefix=hard+drive+external+adapter%2Caps%2C141&rh=n%3A541966%2Ck%3Ahard+drive+external+adapter

Dngallagher Loc: Wilmington De.

Of course, all of this assumes that the case/adapter has a problem or the power supply is dead. If the drive itself is fried, then it is fried - swapping cases or adapters will do no good.

If the power supply is good, and the drive spins up, is detected by the computer, but has errors on reading, it is possible that a night in the freezer will bring it back to life for a short period, long enough to read the data off of it.

Sometimes even a sharp smack to the drive will bring it back to life ;)

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Here are some things you can do with old hard drives.

http://wdc.com/ventito/tech/howto/90-things-to-do-with-a-hard-drive

Bobbee

jerryc41 wrote:

Here are some things you can do with old hard drives.

http://wdc.com/ventito/tech/howto/90-things-to-do-with-a-hard-drive

I like #23. I was at a customer and he had some magnets from an old z/OS drive. I could hardly pull these things off his desk.

donnahde Loc: Newark, DE

wmontgomery wrote:

If you can hear the drive spinning, try SpinRite b... (show quote)

And grc.com is a respected company. I had their product for almost a month and decided not to risk using it on my Windows 8.1 machine simply because I'm not very tech savvy and what I researched scared me. I finally decided to ask them for a refund a few days ago and they've already applied the $89 back to my account. VERY reputable! From what I've read spinrite is much easier to use on the older versions of Windows than 8.1. Good luck.