Recovery software?

[yanksno1]

My HP EX475 looks like it's died and I'm trying to back up the files from the OS HDD. When I hook it up to a dock and try and click on a folder it tells me to reformat the folder. Obviously I don't want to reformat the HDD since I'll lose my data. You guys have any suggestions on any recovery software?

 

[guavasauce]

sounds like the hdd is what died on the hp. have you tried loading linux to a usb drive and running it live? this might help you get the files. the reason it wants you to format them is probably due to curruption.

 

[yanksno1]

I was thinking that based on not being able to click on the folder and it requesting a reformat. But I tried putting in my 2nd 2TB HDD to do a system restore, and after I click on the pin hole to restore it, it just continues booting up as normal. So I thought something was wrong w the system. But obviously something is wrong w the OS drive itself. Do you have any tutorials to put linux and get to the files the way you described? That'd help a lot.

 

[house70]

You can try to download Ubuntu on a CD or a USB drive, as explained on their website. After that you can run it from either media (without installation) and access the HDD content to recover the files you need.