Damaged HDD, Trying to backup files using a Dock Station. Users subfolders are "Empty"

Vesker

Honorable
Oct 3, 2012
22
0
10,510
So, my girlfriend dropped her laptop and damaged her HDD. I took the HDD and plugged in my Case's Dock Station. The Drive is pretty unstable and slow. I can access almost anything, Program Files, Windows Folder, etc, BUT the Users subfolders is locked away and I don't have permission to see it, I tried to grant me permission but I always get "access denied" . The most important files are on the "D://User/Caroline/Documents"
Problem is, the "Caroline" folder is "empty", at least that's what Windows says.
I've tried to obtain permission but it always denies me, I tried to copy the "empty" folder and it remains stuck on "discovering items".
I tried to use Recuva with no success(it becomes stuck while scanning the drive, just on her Drive, tested on the other Drives and it works fine).
The Drive says that 512Gb are Free of 689Gb so I know the files are there they just wont show up.
Please help!
 
Solution
Hi there Vesker,

As long as you can access the drive and transfer you data, despite the fact that it is really slow, my suggestion would be keep on doing that and start with the most important data.
It seems that software tools will not help as your system freezes.

One thing you can give a try is the Ubuntu Live CD approach. Just boot up Ubuntu from a CD or a flash drive and try to copy the data. Sometimes, Ubuntu handles failing drives better: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/267999-32-recover-data-mode

Hope this will help,
D_Know_WD

Vesker

Honorable
Oct 3, 2012
22
0
10,510
Ok, so, I booted up in Safe Mode and everything is accessible. Now that that's out of the way, I've encountered another problem, the Hard-Drive is damaged, everything is REALLY slow, I mean, like, 15kb/s Copying speed. Some files are copy/pasted with no problem(still slow), others give an I/O Device Error.
My question is, is there a way to copy the files without relying on the Broken HDD's transfer speed?
 
Hi there Vesker,

As long as you can access the drive and transfer you data, despite the fact that it is really slow, my suggestion would be keep on doing that and start with the most important data.
It seems that software tools will not help as your system freezes.

One thing you can give a try is the Ubuntu Live CD approach. Just boot up Ubuntu from a CD or a flash drive and try to copy the data. Sometimes, Ubuntu handles failing drives better: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/267999-32-recover-data-mode

Hope this will help,
D_Know_WD
 
Solution