Data Recovery. Hard Drive Won’t Start Up, Only 2 Months Old And Makes A Clicking Noise.?

I need to know if this is an easy problem to fix or if there is a cheap way under $500(AU) to get the data back. It is an 80GB hard drive with less than 25GB of data. Would software recovery work? Or is it a mechanical problem?
It is a SATA hard drive out of a laptop. I have attempted to plug it in using an external hard drive casing but nothing was detected… please please help!!

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8 Responses to “Data Recovery. Hard Drive Won’t Start Up, Only 2 Months Old And Makes A Clicking Noise.?”

  • Boomer&K:

    These days you hear about a lot of hard drives developing problems – thats true!! Proababy because of falling standards of mfg process. There are several method to recover the data. Usually, the first preference is recovering data on your own as it promises the best privacy of your data!! So try these things:
    1) First thing first – try replacing all the cables. When you use the SATA to USB converter – are you sure you are keeping the hard disk in “Master” mode?? hard disk won’t be detected unless you do that. if you have already tried these then your hard disk has mechanical/electronic card problem. Also, try installing hard disk on a different Laptop – instead of USB-TO-SATA converter.
    2) Try the manufacturer for guaranteed data recovery. if they can’t promise – then try buying an identical hard drive – replace the top hard disk controller board and save your data. most of times it is the faulty controller card, You can use “PC inspector” file recovery tool. Please note – this trick could void the warranty
    3) if somehow the disk is detected and you see there are too many bad sectors/ MFT corruption – you can use hard disk sector regenerator – there are some softwares which allows sector regeneration without loosing data. if this is the case – after recovering the data – either replace the disk or use low level format.
    If nothing works try this company – they are masters of data recovery. They charge around AU $900http://www.recoverdata.com.au/
    other companies are:http://www.ontrackdatarecovery.com.au/http://www.doctordisk.com.au
    hard disk regenerator:http://www.dposoft.net/http://www.yaodownload.com/utilites/data…
    Hard disk low level format:http://www.downloadjunction.com/product/…

  • Probably it’s a mechanical defect either due to bad manufacturing or due to a direct shock to the case or Hard Drive.
    If your BIOS can see your hard drive, then nothing wrong with the electronic board (Hopefully)
    The problem is that you cannot boot from that external hard drive and cannot see it’s contents, check the connecting cable, AND change your place, it could be a noisy environment with bad shielding cable.
    If the data is not so important you can Format.
    BUT if your data is that important then try first using software found onhttp://www.xtort.net/system-utilities/di…
    regards,
    :)

  • PeeVeeOh:

    SATA has no problem it is hot swappable which means it can be add/remove without turning off the power.
    we could not discount the possibility that the drive is damaged.
    if it was a mechanical problem then the best way to do is have it recovered using low level techniques but you have to put out some cash.
    for software recovery, the reliability of the recovered files is not reliable enough but they do have a chance.
    good luck!!!!

  • nuwa:

    post your problem in http://www.hddguru.com
    forum. Some professionals will help u

  • Doug:

    What I would do is download Knoppix Linux Live, which is an OS that runs off a disk. Insert that and see if you can see the data. If so, get yourself a flash drive or external drive (if it is a large amount of data you wish to recover) and simply copy the data to the flash drive or external drive using Knoppix. Personally, I would buy a Knoppix DVD rather than wait for it to download. There are CD versions of Knoppix too. You need to be able to burn either one. Just do a search and you will find it.
    It may also be a problem in BIOS. You may need to go into BIOS by restarting your computer and hitting the F2 key during start-up and then navigating to disk drives on your computer and changing the setting for SATA to “normal” rather than “combination”. Save the changes and exit.

  • cornflak:

    Do a google search on ‘click of doom’ – the name says it all, sorry
    You should turn up something helpful like:http://askbobrankin.com/hard_drive_makes…
    On the bright side – at 2 months it will still be under warranty
    As for the data – I suggest you approach the manufacturer – they might be able to advise on who the most appropriate recovery agent is, (tooled up to handle their badly behaved drives) – that’s if they can’t do it themselves
    I realise it’s possibly too late for that disk, but you should have a backup strategy that meets your needs – most of the time, week old data is better than nothing at all. AND having a slightly out of date address book on the backups is your best option (ye Gods, I don’t know what I’d do if I lost that).
    Best of luck

  • JT_8:

    If it’s clicking or making noises that’s a mechanical failure. Not much you can do on your own unless you have your own clean room. If you can live without the data, it return the drive for warranty. Otherwise you can send it to a data recovery specialist, warranty safe, and pay a bit of money to get back your stuff. My company have used these guys in the past and they were very good.http://www.cbltech.com

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