My External HDD not Working

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asaldharan

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Dec 26, 2012
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Hi,

I have an Seagate External 500 GB HDD. Suddenly It stopped working and there is no activity on LED light, no vibration nothing.

I approached a Seagate service centre here in chennai and they are ready to replace the HDD but they dont do a Data recovery.

I somewhat searched in the internet for data recovers and all are saying that My HDD Head's unit got damaged and will cost around 20000 INR for Data recovery.

So anyone here knows anybody doing Data recovery ( Probably for low cost) please let me know.

Thanks
 
20K is also the quote one colleague of mine got as quote for similar job here in Kolkata too. Basically there are two parts to their charge, one part is accquiring (buying) an identical unit for spare parts and then exchanging parts to make the disk working again. The second part is their service charges clubbed with their assesment of how much you can afford and how desperate you are to make the recovery happen. Try enquiring in few computer assembly shops if they can give you any local contact. However in Kolkata I once knew people who has done the same in less than 8K but then again at that time the disk was 20 GB only and now it is 500 GB for most.
 
I had two WD drives die on me in the last two months. In both cases WD replaced these (which were a few days old only) with refurbished drives. In both cases data recovery was so expensive it wasn't worth it and I learnt the lesson to back up a couple of times over all my data. Backing up data is in itself also a really expensive proposition, but there does not seem any way out of this.
 
I went to Micron in Adyar, who gave me a free diagnosis: read/write head is dead, nothing we can do.

I then went to Stellar in T Nagar, who quoted a huge sum of money.

Backing up data is in itself also a really expensive proposition...
Click to expand...

Cost is two to three times that of having just one disk. Cost of data recovery, if one really needed it, might be ten or twenty times, or even impossible.

Looked at that way, keeping back up disks is just not expensive at all!

I have two external hdds for backup. One is kept at another house, and I swap them around every few weeks, so that period is my biggest exposure in case of the whole system melting. Or the whole house... As long as I survive, the disaster would have to hit a huge chunk of Southern Chennai to leave me without most of my data!
 
Earlier I used to backup in DVDs and an External HD. Cutting a DVD is also a pain, and sometimes the DVD also goes for a toss. After that I always buy the Ext HD in pairs. I use "robocopy" between them once a week to keep them in sync.
 
There is a possibility that the USB to SATA/PATA bridge has failed. If you are willing to forgo your warranty, you can try to open the external case and get the actual hard disk out. You can then purchase a cheap USB-sata/pata enclosure (Rs. 350 - 500) and connect through it and see if it works.
 
I somewhat searched in the internet for data recovers and all are saying that My HDD Head's unit got damaged and will cost around 20000 INR for Data recovery.
Click to expand...

It looks like he has a diagnosis already, and one indicating that the fault is with the disc internals, and not with the external circuit board. It also looks like the diagnosis is confirmed from multiple sources. Probably not much point in swapping circuit boards.

I seem to remember, although I might be wrong, something about the recovery companies having arrangements with the manufacturers that the warranty is honoured when they have disassembled a disk. If one is going to pay the huge price of recovery with internal head damage, buying a new disk is probably not that big a deal! :eek:
 
mowgli80 said:
There is a possibility that the USB to SATA/PATA bridge has failed. If you are willing to forgo your warranty, you can try to open the external case and get the actual hard disk out. You can then purchase a cheap USB-sata/pata enclosure (Rs. 350 - 500) and connect through it and see if it works.
Click to expand...

this is a good idea too. In
 
mowgli80 said:
There is a possibility that the USB to SATA/PATA bridge has failed. If you are willing to forgo your warranty, you can try to open the external case and get the actual hard disk out. You can then purchase a cheap USB-sata/pata enclosure (Rs. 350 - 500) and connect through it and see if it works.
Click to expand...

this is a good idea too. In the worst case you will end up paying 300 more against 20K and if it works then its your day.
 
I somehow read that as "everybody on internet says head unit got damaged". I still feel its worth a try as data recoverers might do a fake diagnosis to make a quick buck.
 
I somewhat searched in the internet for data recovers and all are saying that My HDD Head's unit got damaged
Click to expand...

It's clear to me that he has seen some recovery people and that is what they say. But then, I would say that, because that's how I read it :lol:

asaldharan certainly should visit (if he hasn't already) a couple of specialists. The diagnosis should be free. No point in messing around when there are experts to do it!
 
Thad E Ginathom said:
It looks like he has a diagnosis already, and one indicating that the fault is with the disc internals, and not with the external circuit board. It also looks like the diagnosis is confirmed from multiple sources. Probably not much point in swapping circuit boards.

I seem to remember, although I might be wrong, something about the recovery companies having arrangements with the manufacturers that the warranty is honoured when they have disassembled a disk. If one is going to pay the huge price of recovery with internal head damage, buying a new disk is probably not that big a deal! :eek:
Click to expand...

Yes. You are right. I already got an approval from seagate service center to open the disk from outside source. But Since the cost is very high, I thought of asking some suggestions ( may be someone knows person doing these kind of stuffs) in this forum for the sake of saving some penny.
 
Thad E Ginathom said:
It's clear to me that he has seen some recovery people and that is what they say. But then, I would say that, because that's how I read it :lol:

asaldharan certainly should visit (if he hasn't already) a couple of specialists. The diagnosis should be free. No point in messing around when there are experts to do it!
Click to expand...

Let me know any people doing Data recovery. Since you are also in chennai, it will be easy for me to approach them directly.

I already approached the one near Ritchie street and another one at near Ethiraj college. Both told the same thing.

And also approached one center in bangalore through email, again the same story.

The only response I get from my HDD is a "Crackling sound" for few seconds that's it, then it will go dead.
 
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