Salvaging Data from a Laptop

[smi1inpanda]

My laptop started to act up a little. Then it broke down on me ( I believe it is mainly because some files related to Windows were corrupted ). I am trying to retrieve the data that is in the hard drive. I took out the hard drive and put it onto a eSATA dock. When trying to explore it, the computer would freeze up a little ( the explorer would try to load it, but end up freezing and also chrome would freeze up ). Would you think there is a way around this or no?

 

[phil22]

It needs testing first, then if the test report says "Failed" there's no point in trying to do anything with it (unless you have pockets deep enough to pay a data recovery service).

Regardless of it's make, test the drive with "SeaTools for Windows". Click downloads here: http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/seatools/

If SeaTools cannot test it because there are "too many errors to test", or it can't access it, it's definitely failed completely.

 

[itdataman]

If it starts making any noise, be sure to stop using it and get it to a data recovery place that will evaluate it for free. Good data recovery software will not write to your failing drive and will self-boot from a disk or external. You can try RecoverBot for free and I know it's a self booting disc ( http://recoverbot.com ). I've heard about Recuva and ClickFree as well, but I've never tried them.