data protection question

dapex

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I know this isn't really the best place for this question but I am a bit desperate and I trust the level of knowledge on this board so please forgive me in advance.

It looks like I may have lost my main HD on my PC, after looking on google etc there seems to be plenty of data recovery programs etc so hopefully I will be able to save all my info but the fact that the HD has died and is less than 1 yr old has scared the hell out of. This HD has thousdands of irreplacable family photo's on, loads of software and books I have bought from places like clickbank and all the emails which give me the passwords etc to redownload them all. All my webdesign stuff, site backups etc etc....

As you can imagine i am a bit gutted and so I have decided to make sure this never happens again and this is where i need help.... What is the best way to ensure this type of thing cant happen again?? I have previously tried using Nero (i think) to back up my HD but if i remember corrctly it also wanted to back up the empty space and so for my 200gig drive it was going to take ages and a pile of dvd's so I dont really see this as a viable on going solution. yes I could back up the pics once a month but still not ideal.

can you buy an external raid type box with 2 drives in that will mirror each other or anyhting like that..... saying that I dont need 2 drives in the external box just one to mirror my HD????

if anyone has any advice on what softare to try to restore my data then please let me know....

Cheers
 
There are companies who can retreive data from HDDs do a google. It may be expensive though. Always backup your pics to CD on a regular basis. Use microsoft calendar to remind you each month or so or set it as a shedualed task. My drive failed also after one year, mine was a maxtor, have everything on disc now. plus installed a case fan, and although its a bit noisy its supposed to extend the HDDs life by keeping things a bit cooler. We shall see, but at £6.00 its not expensive.
 
I know this isn't idea either, but you can get a 250gig external hard drive (from PC World of all place...) and that can store all your data. The best way of storing data is, as you know, by doing backups, but throughout my years of using a pc, and since I qualified as a pc hardware engineer, I've come to the conclusion that the more places you store your data the better. I know it's overkill and you shouldn't need to do it, but I keep my important data stored on my hard-drive, my external hard drive and on dvd's in the form of backups. PC's die, they become corrupeted or have viruses hit them, discs get damaged or lost, the list is endless. My personal advice is to make sure you keep lots of copies of your important stuff, no matter how much you shouldn't NEED to make multiple copies. Poo happens, best have plenty of scrapers.
 
There used to be an external Maxtor drive with a button on it, I believe, which could then backup your main drive - that's the easy low-tech solution.

As to data recovery, most companies use the usual data recovery tools you can buy (Getdataback or Ontrack tools) to do simple recovery jobs - depending on what's happened. They are very good at recovering pictures, docs etc.

Depending on what's wrong with the drive, you would be best to get a new one, install your OS etc (remove the old drive first). Install a recovery tool, then attach the old drive to the secondary hard disk controller - so your clean install boots up. Keep the faulty drive as cool as possible - I usually have an aluminium plate from a caddy on top, then I place a large fan on top of that. You may find it will give you enough time to recover your data.
 
First, are you aware that there are companies who can attempt to recover data from failed disks? More often than not the failure is electro-mechanical and the disk media itself is intact or only partially damaged? You may therefore be able to recover some or all of the lost files.

As for backups, I'm not sure about the need to save free space issue you raise, normal backup programs only backup files and even 'imager' backups usually exclude free space.

However, to simply backup data files something simple like Second Copy to an external disk may be all you need.
 
KraGorn said:
First, are you aware that there are companies who can attempt to recover data from failed disks? More often than not the failure is electro-mechanical and the disk media itself is intact or only partially damaged? You may therefore be able to recover some or all of the lost files.
Having worked for a Data Recovery company for about 2 years, most of the time it's a head crash. Sometimes the platters are fine, othertimes they have serious damage on them. It's also worth noting that these companies will charge anywhere from £200 to £2000 or more for a recovery (I would know!). If it is a head crash (drive clicks) - then you have 2 options, get them to recover it, or risk it using my method :) If you can convince the drive to work for about 30 mins you should be ok.
 
ok then, when i try to boot from my dead HD i get just to the start of the loading eindows XP screen then it reboots, I happen to have an old 20gig drive lying around that has xp on it, I put the old drive in my pc and it boots fine onits own. If i add my dead HD as secondary slave then windows will nto boot, it gets to the final stages and then i get a blue screen that flashes to quickly for me to read the message and then reboots... after this it reboots, gets to screen to scan the drives, finds a few problems, then starts scrolling loads of orphaned files, syas its fixed everthing. carryies on booting until i get a blue screen and it all starts over again....

Its starting to look like a may struggle to get this drive even in and working as a 2nd drive....:mad: :mad: :mad: :eek:
 

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