Dead Drive : Time to get tough

Mike · 11-06-2008, 18:50

Hi all

One of my drives in my PC appears dead. Tried powering down and reconnecting leads at the back all with no luck. It appears warm so I know there is power going into it. Any ideas on how to kick it back into live even thought about taking it out and tapping it to try and free things up.

Any ideas before I get the hammer out

!!!

Many thanks

Mike

hoggie · 11-06-2008, 22:36

is the drive still being seen in my computer ?
if you have another pc try the slave in that.(just a test to see if mother board is not going up the wall)

DaiNasty · 12-06-2008, 05:52

What make and size of drive Mike?. There are some that are prone to bearing failure in which case you are probably stuffed..

punky · 12-06-2008, 07:53

If you are sure its not spinning, you could try sticking it in your freezer. I'm being serious, it has been known to work in some cases.

**Kymmy** · 12-06-2008, 08:37

Also power it on whilst holding it flat in your hand and semi gently spin your hand backwards and forwards, you'll know if it frees the platters as it'll start feeling resistance in one direction.

If there's no data on it you want back then see if the drive is under warrant as a lot of drives have 3 years on them. Also another trick that I've done in the workshop especially when the board is kaput is to swap the board with an identical board from an indentical working unit...I've saved quite a few customers hundreds in recovery fees by doing it that way

Kymmy

Mike · 13-06-2008, 05:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by DaiNasty

What make and size of drive Mike?. There are some that are prone to bearing failure in which case you are probably stuffed..

Thanks for this............

Make is a Maxtor 160GB SATA I have taken it out and when I power it up I can feel things happening in the driver and it sounds like it's trying to read from it.

My PC recently crashed and I reloaded windows could it be I have lost drivers which would result in it not being recongised in windows explorer ?

Thanks again

Regards

Mike

**Graham M** · 13-06-2008, 06:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kymmy

If there's no data on it you want back then see if the drive is under warrant as a lot of drives have 3 years on them. Also another trick that I've done in the workshop especially when the board is kaput is to swap the board with an identical board from an indentical working unit...I've saved quite a few customers hundreds in recovery fees by doing it that way

You have to be sure that the board is kaput for this to work though, if the heads are sticking or the platters aren't spinning due to a mechanical fault, this won't have any affect at all, however if the board is at fault, the donor drive needs to be identical, not just in model as this won't always do, but in firmware version, so unless you can see the donor drive before you buy it then it's not a guarantee, so buying online is pretty much useless!

**Kymmy** · 13-06-2008, 08:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mike

Thanks for this............

Make is a Maxtor 160GB SATA I have taken it out and when I power it up I can feel things happening in the driver and it sounds like it's trying to read from it.

My PC recently crashed and I reloaded windows could it be I have lost drivers which would result in it not being recongised in windows explorer ?

Thanks again

Regards

Mike

If it's windows XP (with at least SP2) you should have no problem with drivers...

Something though to try first.

Firstly see if the disk is detected in your device manager

If it is then right click on my computer, select MANAGE and then when the management console pops up select DISK MANAGEMENT

Have a look at the list (should list all the dirves available) see if one says something like unknown or dynamic if it does then you can right click and try either reactivate or import....(If in any doubt take a screen shot of the list and post it here...there's no security info on it)

Worth a try

Kymmy

---------- Post added at 09:25 ---------- Previous post was at 09:19 ----------

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zeph

You have to be sure that the board is kaput for this to work though, if the heads are sticking or the platters aren't spinning due to a mechanical fault, this won't have any affect at all, however if the board is at fault, the donor drive needs to be identical, not just in model as this won't always do, but in firmware version, so unless you can see the donor drive before you buy it then it's not a guarantee, so buying online is pretty much useless!

Firmware versions aren't normally a problem as for sticking heads I did say to try the hand test first.

I suppose being an ex-component level tech for a large 3rd party services company and then running my own workshop in London for a couple of years it's ever so easy to go hyper technical and lose a few people or even suggest solutions that someone at home without the right tools just couldn;t do

But the solution I said does work if the board is kaput and it's one fo the reasons as to why I have two identical drives in my pc

Kymmy

hoggie · 13-06-2008, 19:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mike

Thanks for this............

Make is a Maxtor 160GB SATA I have taken it out and when I power it up I can feel things happening in the driver and it sounds like it's trying to read from it.

My PC recently crashed and I reloaded windows could it be I have lost drivers which would result in it not being recongised in windows explorer ?

Thanks again

Regards

Mike

check the drive is being seen in the bios as it could be a dead controller on the board. is the other drive still working 100% ok
if you can still see the iffy drive in the bios,its not the controller