data recovery - any tips?

[liquidmonkey]

long story short, have a Maxtor HDD that puts my PC into a BSOD reboot loop so i ran powermax and it determined that my drive was screwed and gave me 'diagnostics error - de9aa975'. i found this page
http://maxtor.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/maxtor.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=538
on the error codes and that code above is not really an error code at all, only a reference.
in powermax i did the following,
checked the 'installation confirmation' - that passed
checked the 'basic quick test' - full read scan was recommended
checked the 'advanced test (full read scan)' and after 10 seconds it came back with the diagnostics code and said that 'this drive is failing and must be replaced, if you do not have a recent backup, then you should make one now blah blah blah'.
so now the question is, is there anyway that i can use data recovery software to get any data back? otherwise its 200gigs of stuff gonzo.
any recommendations?

 

[OatesyX]

my recomendation is a quick format,then use a program (loads out there,try google) to scan for deleted files

 

[jcortes]

preform the quick format then use a program like Recover My Files (search it in google its outstanding) and get the files you need back

 

[harddisk]

what is your harddisk's model?
can you check it by HDDSCAN utility (http://www.hddfirmware.net/bbs/index.php?showtopic=46)
this utility can run under the windows
and tell me the result

 

[patrick]

Data Recovery

Not to sound like a broken record but quick formatting is a good idea. I would then use software that you could run right from the CD like Recover Lost Data by StompSoft. This should allow you to get back the data you need. Though if you don't have the patience you could just download their demo just to see if it will work in your situation. Good Luck.

Pat

 

[liquidmonkey]

@harddisk
sorry, link was broken.
however the model of my HDD is this
MAXTOR DiamondMax PLUS 9
160Gig SATA / 150 HDD

@patrick
yup, gonna try your suggestions now. will let you know

 

[liquidmonkey]

ok, here's what i have done now.
went into the power maxx program during boot up, did a 'quick format' which then told me it would relpace the first 300MB with zero's and then the last 100MB with zero's. i'm not even sure what that means?
now i'm trying to recover the data using PC inspector and a few other programs.

 

[liquidmonkey]

the problem is solved!!!! thanks to a few forum posts, some great advice and A LOT of screwing around with recovery programs.
the one that worked for me is called 'recover my files' and it works very very very well if anyone is in a similar situation. :clapping:
it took about 25 hours to do a complete scan of the 180gig drive for picture and movie files. was able to get about 80% of everything back, EVEN things that i had 'deleted' many months before the drive crashed. this being my first experience with data recovery i was super impressed at the amount of things one can recover months after a deletion. some of the movie files recovered were 150gigs in size and i'm not sure what they were so i just ignored them.
otherwise, i'm pretty happy and want to thank you all for your help :clapping:

 

[Dave-427SS]

Liquidmonkey, maybe you (or someone) can help me with some advice then. I got myself in real trouble when I tried to update the BIOS. Somehow the procedure corrupted a lot of system files and I couldn't boot. The recovery console in XP would not even recognize the hard drive (300gb Maxtor) anymore. I wanted to avoid re-formatting (thus losing data), so I had to purchase a separate hard drive (200gb Maxtor) and install new system off that drive.

So now my computer is working again, but a lot of my data is residing on my old drive.

I tried ZAR (Zero Assumption Recovery) to recover the files and the program works, it sees the files but you need to buy the program to transfer them. Also, they want $80 for a single-user license. That's just too much money for a program I'll probably only use one time.

I'm gonna try the "recover my files"..........

thanks

 

[stef]

Hi

i have a similar problem so i dont want to open a new thread.

but i had some issues with mobo and my windows wouldnt boot, so i had to downgrade it to work fine, but my new Maxtor HDD suddenly shows us as a newly installed drive. And the only thing i can do with it is format it.

Anyone know how that happened coz i had 160GB of stuff on it yesterday...

and is really only one way to get my files back with format/recovery?

thx