And if UBCD4Win won’t let you read the disk, try Knoppix or some other Linux live CD.  I’ve found that Linux will sometimes mount a damaged NTFS partition that Windows won’t (and vise versa).

From: MSU Network Administrators Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Melvin Micke
Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 8:32 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [MSUNAG] How hard should you hit an ailing hard drive?

This sounds like directory corruption, not an electronics failure.  You probably still have access to much of the drive, just not the area needed to run the OS.  Create a UBCD4Win disk and boot from that. Have a USB drive plugged into the system so that you have alternate storage ready to copy anything you find still accessible.

________________________________________
Mel  

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From: MSU Network Administrators Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Richard Wiggins
Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 10:21 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [MSUNAG] How hard should you hit an ailing hard drive?

My wife's home computer, a very kewl as of 2001 Gateway desktop-and-monitor PC, died today.  The hard drive is able to begin to boot Windows XP -- you see the logo -- so that implies that some data is loading from the disk.  However you hear lots of seeking noises, and ultimately no finding. 

We probably don't have much data to salvage on it.  I find that in a cloud computing world, I've Gmailed just about anything of importance to her or to whaterver person I'm working with. 

Still, I would like to take one last look at the hard drive. So my question is, and I'm not kidding -- how hard do I hit it?  Do I pick up the unit and drop it?  Do I take a rubber mallet to it?  Do I gently tap it as it tries to boot?

Reminds me of a wisecrack circa 1979 -- on a clear disk, you can seek forever.

Thanks,

/rich

__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3764 (20090114) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

http://www.eset.com

__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3764 (20090114) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

http://www.eset.com