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Data recovery for a WDC 500AAKS

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I have a WDC 500AAKS that is acting strangely. I don't need to salvage the drive itself, but I do need the data off of it...

When I boot into Windows, the OS automatically detects and installs the drive (I don't use it as the proprietary drive). Subsequent to this installation, I checked My Computer for the drive: it does not exist/cannot be mounted. It shows up in Device Manager as an installed disk drive.

I am just looking for some sort of software or basic hardware fix that I can do myself: I'd rather not have to spend $500 on a data recovery service.

Thanks!

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Cpt Deadboots said:
I have a WDC 500AAKS that is acting strangely. I don't need to salvage the drive itself, but I do need the data off of it...

When I boot into Windows, the OS automatically detects and installs the drive (I don't use it as the proprietary drive). Subsequent to this installation, I checked My Computer for the drive: it does not exist/cannot be mounted. It shows up in Device Manager as an installed disk drive.

I am just looking for some sort of software or basic hardware fix that I can do myself: I'd rather not have to spend $500 on a data recovery service.

Thanks!



well could be data corruption (accident/virus/shutdown incorrectly - corruption etc) - first things first, test the HDD and see if its in bad health to see what your dealing with and post back with results, dont do ANYTHING till you know what your up against there.

WD has its own diag tools (free) on there website which will actually work with all HDD's etc and can even repair minor issues (bad sectors which can lead to what you see) etc - TEST FIRST!
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That's a double edged sword. Testing a drive that is failing can cause it to degrade to a point that the data won't be accessible at all. Given the problem of it not being recognized properly, I would check the SMART stats first and then flip a coin on whether to test or just recover. It might even be a bad cable or improper strapping.

Zorg said:
That's a double edged sword. Testing a drive that is failing can cause it to degrade to a point that the data won't be accessible at all. Given the problem of it not being recognized properly, I would check the SMART stats first and then flip a coin on whether to test or just recover. It might even be a bad cable or improper strapping.


Highly unlikely you will get further loss since its already total loss in terms of access etc, and from all the experience iv had with this, a simple test never degraded the hdd/data further.

Since device manager detects it, its aware of device presence and perhaps thinks it isnt formatted or is detected as RAW and unreadable in windows - no point in giving a way to fix that if it might happen again, TEST IT FIRST.

If you dont trust my advice, just simply contact a data recovery centre and get them to do it for you at an extreme price (many $$$'s) ;) 

Go here

http://trinityhome.org/Home/index.php?wpid=1&front_id=1...

Download the trinity rescue kit. It's a linux distro with many helpful tools. You may want to read this list of commands as well

http://trinityhome.org/Home/index.php?wpid=59&front_id=...

If you use the TRK disk to boot up with you can try to recover the partition and then use your computer as a file server to transfer the files to another computer on your network, or enter commands manually to transfer files to your other hard disk.

apache_lives said:
Highly unlikely you will get further loss since its already total loss in terms of access etc, and from all the experience iv had with this, a simple test never degraded the hdd/data further.
If the drive is failing and something like SpinRite can still pull the data off, but you use a tool that does reads and writes to test the drive, then you can finish it off before you can get the data. Pulling the SMART doesn't put the drive through it's paces. All he wants is the data.

No stress here, either way you want.
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