Failed HD Question - Please see my error

[chewster77]

Windows won't boot and all I need are some photos off the hard drive, after that i have no problem throwing it away. Here's what i've tried and seen.

When i boot up it says "Pri Master Hard Disk: S.M.A.R.T. Command Failed Press F1 to resume"

If i boot up and let scan disk run i get a scrolling screen with sequenced numbers saying "File record segment XXXX is unreadable" (X represents a number, for example it goes 5173, 5174, 5175, etc.)

I've tried windows repair by booting with windows 2000 cd and when i do repair it says no version of windows is found in hd.

I've tried to put a different hd as the master and set the bad one as slave so i could try to get files thru windows explorer. However, once windows comes up i get a blue screen with "*** Stop: 0x0000000A (0x000080B3, 0x0000001c, 0x00000000, 0x80415556) IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL

Am I screwed? I would appreciate any ideas to get this drive up.

Thank you,

 

[bigbadjohnnyb]

Do a google search for "data recovery" and find a program you can demo. There are many out there now-a-days. You'll want to get this drive out of your system ASAP so that no other changes can occur on it.

Then, get another drive and load Windows onto it, and then load the demo software. Then, reattach the dead drive and let it scan the drive. If it can recover the files you want, it'll tell you - then you can purchase the software (usually an unlock key) - and then you're set... hopefully.

 

[Mondoman]

Sorry, in this case BBJB is wrong. Your drive is physically broken (that's what SMART is reporting). No software solution will work. If the data is worth enough to you, send the drive to a data recovery shop where they can try to read data off the platters after disassembling the drive.

 

[bigbadjohnnyb]

Actually I'm not wrong...

SMART isn't a "dead or not dead" check... it indicates if there are enough sector read errors to pass the predefined threshold saying "i'm GOING bad".

Obviously it's physically working, or else it wouldn't be booting half-way into Windows as stated by OP, after which Windows is claiming all the files are messed up during the text-mode checkdisk - it did boot afterall, its just got scrambled bits somewhere vital and can't reach the GUI. So it must be phyiscally working - just too many bad sectors. That's exactly the scenario these recovery programs are designed for.

As long as he keeps it shut off until it can be scanned by a recovery program, I'd bet dollars to donuts it'll recover some of what he wants.

 

[Mondoman]

Sorry, I didn't mean "dead" when I said physically broken. "Bad sectors" doesn't fit my definition of "physically working". No software will *fully* recover his data, while a data recovery shop may be able to fully recover his data. If he only needs some of the data, software may be able to help, as you note. OTOH, the drive's condition may deteriorate even further under the software's heavy workout, so he may end up in worse shape.