The saga of my ongoing computer troubles resumes.
I've had an external hard drive for the last year or two now, and a couple of weeks ago, it failed me a second time. The computer won't read the drive, and I'm not sure what to do. I think it may be because the fan in the enclosure stopped working, but I'm not an expert. Still, the drive was never dropped, so I think it may be a case of overheating.
I've tried a few things to get it to work. Unfortunately, I don't have the files backed up anywhere. I put everything on it in December when my computer crashed and needed to be reformatted, and wasn't able to afford to replace the drive or get myself some flash drives to back up/move the files. So everything is sitting on this drive that I can't access: all of my documents, my tax records from the last couple of years, a ton of my music collection, and pictures of my late sister. It's killing me that I can access these things and rescue them.
This is a SATA drive on a computer that uses IDE drives, so I got a SATA to USB adapter. It recognized my drive for about a minute, but not long enough to get any of the files off of it. I've been fiddling with this thing for hours now and I can't get the computer to recognize the old drive; it registers a USB 2.0 Mass Storage Device which can't be used. It also registers it as a Disk Drive and nothing more. I don't know if this has messed up the data or not since I can never actually access the drive.
I really, really need my old data back. I hate that this is so dire and that this has become such a big deal. I hate being so attached to these things, and I'm starting to feel like my life is incredibly pointless if the loss of these files is such a tragedy to me. I think the only option I'm left with at this point is to go with an outside company to recover the data for me, which I can't afford to do. This is going to cost somewhere between $700 and $800 for me to do this, and with my spotty work ability this year, I just don't see it happening.
So I'm begging you guys now. If anyone can spare twenty bucks, or even less, to pop into the PayPal donations button, I would really, really appreciate it. I need this stuff, and I've been trying to remain cool and calm about my difficulties, but I just can't anymore. I'm sorry to have to resort to just asking for money, but I have nothing else left to me right now.
I hate it that this whole situation has just made me not want to even deal with blogging or being on Tumblr or doing anything at all anymore. I'm starting to wonder what the point of my life is if this is such a crippling blow. I literally don't know what to do anymore, and it just makes me want to stop doing anything.
I hate this.
So, if you can find it in your heart to help me... please.
Monday, March 29, 2010
A Call for Help
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11 comments:
Freeze it, that should get you a little time anyway.
Also, if you could keep it in the freezer with a usb cord connected to your computer (laptop?), if it's a heat problem you should be OK.
Have you tried the drive on another computer? If it works on another computer, then maybe the device driver on your computer is corrupted.
I think Jaquandor's idea has merit.
This may help
Plus, always backup to a CD!
Jonathan M: Thanks for the advice. I've been reluctant to try freezing it, but it seems like heat and not voltage (as I was worried before) may be the problem. I'm letting it cool off right now, and then I'm going to try again.
Jaquandor and MC: It's not the device driver; it does recognize that SOMETHING is there, it just can't access it. When I tried the troubleshooter, it told me the device driver I had for the drive was the most up-to-date. Plus everything else I plug into the USBs is working fine (including another external drive).
I don't have another computer at hand to try out. Someone's going to come and look at it tomorrow, and they will have something else they can hook it up to in order to be certain.
Trippman: Thanks for the link. Unfortunately, my CD burner stopped working over the summer and I haven't been able to replace it. I was holding out for some flash drives, but I was never able to get them.
No Cd drive!? A CD drive is way more important than a flash drive in my opinion. The world hasn't completely gone flash yet. I've seen great drives cost no more than $30
Plus, is it me or have you not tried making money off your writing?
If not, these are some good links
one
two
I'll send you some help via the snail mail but don't look for it for a few weeks yet. Things are tight after the cold ass winter during which our electricity bill triples and after some unexpected stuff popped up, such as our old dishwasher dying on us.
Our bill goes up in the summer; we managed to snag a building where heat is included, but the air conditioner takes the electric bill up in the summer.
I feel weird asking for financial help online. I know other bloggers who have drives to pay bills and it works. I don't know how they do it; I feel like I'm panhandling, and it sucks.
Hey Green... sorry aboot yer trubbles, but we had a similar sitch that drove us crazy, yet had a simple fix. Our first Maxtor external hard drive took a crap so we replaced it with one from Western Digital. However, once it was hooked up we were constrantly having issues with our Norton Firewall and getting catastrophic failures requiring complete resets.
After my wife threatened to de-ball me if it happend again, I called the Western Digital helpline, naturally in Bangalore (cool!) and talked to one tech who was stumped, was then sent on to a supervisor. We walked thru all the thing trying to figger out the problem when, on a whim, he asked me to start listing our software devices until I mentioned the Roxio/Sonic Now CD music burning program. He whooped out loud and asked me to remove that one program that plays holy hell with their external drive. No reason, just one of those things. They have a worldwide service bulletin to warn about the Roxio incompatability.
Ever since then, absolutely NO PROBLEMS, although now we'll have to download or buy a new burning program, but that's cool... a small price to pay to keep my balls, donchathink?
Anywhoo, it may not even me related to your bugaboo, but it SURE SOUNDS FAMILIAR. Good luck!
One other thing - depending on the type of computer you're using - if it's a desktop, try using the USB ports in the back of the computer, sometimes the ports in the front are flaky. It does sound like a heat problem, though. Computers love cold - some crazy modders use liquid nitrogen and such to cool their overclocked rigs.
I do wonder why it is heating up so badly, so quickly. Seems like that would be more than just a cooling fan issue. Does the power come from the USB port or from an extra adapter? Anyways, I hope freezing it works, it has worked for me in the past.
If you can get it to run, but the data is corrupted, I have much success with Active@Undelete software (I "borrowed" it from torrents).
Best of luck, I know how frustrating these crashes can be. At the least I hope you can get the pictures of your sister back.
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