Possible drive failure...

EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
edited January 2004 in Hardware
Machine downstairs was fine, but then it locked up.... restarted it.... BOOT DISK FAILURE..... restarted it.... BIOS didn't detect the drive (it's making a ticking noise)..... Turned it off at the mains, flushed the PSUs caps, and waited a min.... turned it on, ticking, then it works, try too boot windows.... loads for ages then "UNMOUNTABLE BOOT DEVICE".... restart... Now running Maxtors advanced SMART test on it, see what it says.

When the drive tries to read it just goes "TICK chuck..........TICK chuck............TICK chuck.........." and doesn't read.

Basically I just want to confirm this. The drive has been loyal for 4 years (Seagate Barracuda II, 30GB) and has shown no signs of wear, but now it has just failed completely, which leaves my mom kind of screwed as she has all her work on there and no back-ups.

As well as confirming that, what would be the best drive to get at the moment <£100 on a space/speed average?

Comments

  • EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
    edited January 2004
    I think it's official. Half the time it causes my machine to freeze on post. I tried to check it with linux, but have no idea what it was listed under, as it wasn't a hdx drive and it didn't show up as an sdx drive either.
    I take it there is nothing I can do to try and get any of the Data off the drive itself? As I don't see any easy way of doing this.
    I think the only thing is about 200 photos that my dad took with his DC that anyone really cares about on the drive though.
  • DogSoldierDogSoldier The heart of radical Amish country..
    edited January 2004
    Better leave it alone. If it is screwed and you keeping powering it up, you'll lose that much more data. If the data on is of value, you'll need to take it to a data retrieval specialist.
  • EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
    edited January 2004
    DogSoldier wrote:
    Better leave it alone. If it is screwed and you keeping powering it up, you'll lose that much more data. If the data on is of value, you'll need to take it to a data retrieval specialist.

    Thats the point. They aren't likely to want to pay to get it retrieved, they are just going to bitch about it, lots. I just wondered if there was anything I could do my end, though it seems not.
  • EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
    edited January 2004
    Right, I now have to order a new drive, ASAP.

    The two best drives which I can see at the moment are the -
    Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 160GB (7200RPM SATA)
    Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 160GB (7200RPM SATA)

    Any ideas on anything else around that price, or which is the better of those two? I'm not going with a raptor as they are stupidly overpriced.
Sign In or Register to comment.