Data Recovery.. I know, I know.

[ibennetch]

pga, at first I agreed with you, but then I thought about it some more...my understanding of hard drives is that they're sealed without any moisture in them (that would cause problems with normal operation) and so that wouldn't cause any problems with it. correct me if I'm wrong

[3fingersalute]

We yanked the lid off of a Western Digital 1.2GB Hard Drive one time and ran it for several weeks hooked up to a machine here in the store. It worked for about 2-3 weeks everyday before it started having seek errors, so you would probably be able to get away with swapping the platters or R/W heads if you were VERY careful.

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WHERE DO YOU WANT TO GO TODAY?......Not that it matters, because Micrsoft will crash on the way there!!!

[rewep]

Yeah I should try that, I don't have much else to lost at this point. 3finger.. I've done that before, I had the lid off of my 4gb and it did work for about a week before it just quit, so I'm not going to worry about a few minutes to pull a file off of it.

[pga]

i've done it before for a customer who was freaking out about needing his 5 years worth of email. I was able to get 100% of his data.

I charged him the cost of the drive I ripped apart plus an ungodly amount of labor (a sinful amount of labor).

The drives have to be the EXACT SAME MODEL (not just capacity).

[3fingersalute]

PGA.....I had a customer one time bring a drive to us that was FUBAR and needed data desperately....and to quote them, "We need that data, regardless of what you have to do to get it or what it costs! .

I used a program that scanned the root clusters and would allow you to manually rebuild a FAT, (naming directories dir1, dir2, etc.) This took me almost 2 hours, so I charged them 2 hours service (at the time our rate was $25.00/hr) and a $75.00 Data Recovery Charge.

The lady freaked when I told her the total. She said, "You mean I have to pay $125.00 for my data, plus buy a new drive? I thought you guys were going to fix this drive.

I told her to forget the charges, come pick her old drive up, and it would be in the condition sh dropped it off in, and I was throwing away the ZIP disks I had stored her data on......that changed her tune a little.

I love how people say No matter what the cost when what they really mean is, I want it cheap as h*ll !!!!

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WHERE DO YOU WANT TO GO TODAY?......Not that it matters, because Micrsoft will crash on the way there!!!

[Ruslan]

O'k, here is my story.
I had had similar situation with WD22100 drives (worst WD's model, I think).
I also got this "clanging" noise from drive and I thought, what I have to say "bye-bye" my data. And I hadn't same model of WD drive
having to check - drive electronics or mechanics was failed. So,I used...electronics
from WD33100,and ... drive started without any "clanging" noise,and still working now!
Strange thing is what, when bit later I tried to use electronics from exactly same WD22100(good drive!) I've got "clanging" sound from this drive again! Since 1999 I've repaired at least 3 "clanging" WD22100 drives using electronics from WD33100.
Unbelievable story,isn't it? But it true.
And I have to say - never surrender!

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I'm sorry for my bad English,though.

[This message has been edited by Ruslan (edited November 02, 2000).]

[pga]

Originally posted by 3fingersalute:
PGA.....I had a customer one time bring a drive to us that was FUBAR and needed data desperately....and to quote them, "We need that data, regardless of what you have to do to get it or what it costs! .

I love how people say No matter what the cost when what they really mean is, I want it cheap as h*ll !!!!

I told my customer up front it would be over $500 (even if I recovered NO DATA). They were willing to take the risk and they got lucky. Their bill was $139 for the drive and $200 for labor ($339 total bill).

I know what ya mean with the "no matter what it costs". This customer was quoted $500 first. The $339 bill was ideal for them, only because i quoted high, to cover my a$$. I knew them well enough that they would have paid $500 for no data, and they even committed to that first.

But I know the customers you are speaking of that say that and then think $15 is too much....

Ummm.. I need a kidney transplant, but if it's over $50 you are ripping me off!!!!

Umm... I need new brake pads but $20 for labor and pads is too much!!!

Techs... in the eyes of the average person (i.e. idiot) we are a group of low life scum with our only purpose in life is to overcharge for our knowledge.

btw, if you are a customer of mine, it was just a punn intended for other techs...


[This message has been edited by pga (edited November 02, 2000).]