Hard Drive Recovery - Comments

I've read about a program named "SpinRite" by Steve Gibson. Some say it's very good at data recovery from a bad hard drive. I think it costs around $90 dollars. That's a lot of money but probably worth it if it works as well as they say. Has anyone used this software?

EDITOR'S NOTE: I've read good reviews about SpinRite. I suggest you try TESTDISK first, since it's free. But if it doesn't do the job, give SpinRite a try.

At this point, I think the question should be which is best for a boot drive (as in drive C:), a backup or an image. You have a drive that is gasping it's final breath or perhaps the head has decided to play Bulldozer on the surface so you know you will be replacing it. If it's the boot drive, an image is better since a backup won't give you the full drive (at least the backup solutions I've tried don't). I'll leave it to you to decide which image software to get.

Running an Imager once a month with regular backups once a week (for the average user) will safeguard a system's contents and allow for a quick way to recover data onto a new drive.

EDITOR'S NOTE: I like Acronis True Image for backups and disk imaging.

I was installing Norton System Works - GoBack on my Second (NTFS) Hard Disk (not the boot Drive). The program hung and now I am unable to read the Second NTFS hard disk. The primary (Boot) drive is not in NTFS format. Are there any suggestions for me.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Sounds like a job for TESTDISK. If the partition table was damaged, it should be able to fix it.

Move the sable from one plug to the other... What "sable" is?

EDITOR'S NOTE: That was a typo... fixed to show "cable" now.

Ive just been through a nightmare scenario for one of my clients. She had 15 years of business information on her PC, which managed to totally trash the FAT one day (this was a WinXP system). I tried all the usual tools (after making an image copy of the damaged drive). None could recover near enough of the information on the drive to make much difference for her.
I then 'lucked' on a program called "Kernel for Windows" from www.nucleustechnologies.com. Its claim was to be able to recover information from damaged disks, and in this case, performed wonderfully. The directory names were not recoverable, but every single file (including some that had been deleted up to 2 years before) were recovered and written to a second disk.
I am not associated with the company in any manner - this is not a paid advertisment! (in fact, I paid them!) - but it has given me the best results I have ever had, equally matching their claims. If anyone else has similar problems, would recommend this program.

I am surpised there was no mention of the 'freezer' method for recovery. I was a 'doubter' until I saw it work multiple times.
It is not a 'cure' but a great method to get data off, if you are quick..

I use SpinRite. It is a phenomenal piece of software. If you have a seriously defective hard drive, you are probably going to run it for a few days, so you might want a backup computer to use in the mean time. Also, don't rely on SMART technology to tell you when your hard drive is dying. SMART is dumb. Half the time it is 100% wrong about the status of the drive. Nothing beats being prepared. Don't replace your normal backup with data recovery. You'd be sorry.

My computer crashed (clicking sound & I did not back-up). It is now w/ my local computer repair person, who is wonderful. He is going to try to retrieve the information on my crashed hard drive, warning me that he may call Monday morning recommending a place that specializes in hard drive recovery ... and to get ready to pay from $1000-$2500. This is a Mac PowerBook G4 Titanium (lap top), BTW. Do you know of any of these hard drive recovery businesses that are reported to be a good deal (charge the least)?

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I have 2 Hard Drives on my PC, using the second one to store backup files. The other day I saw that when I opened My Computer to access my 2nd drive, the name of the drive and all of it's folders have symbols in place of letters, ie. you can't read anything. Has the drive crashed or is their another issue at hand?

EDITOR'S NOTE: Sounds like the file access table got munged. Try the TESTDISK program mentioned above. It worked for me.