Computer he!!

[AlwaysOnAuto]

Well it was bound to happen and it finally did.
Seems my hard drive decided 5 yrs was enough.
It would not boot this morning and I have been trying all day to get it going.
Guess I get to start the new decade from ground zero scratch.
To say I am bummed is an understatement.

 

[unlo]

sorry to hear about your HDD loss! perhaps some files can still be recovered. Fingers crossed!

 

[bdbits]

Ouch. No backups? Which reminds me, I need to check and make sure mine is working.

If it is an actual hard drive making on-going clicking noises, power it off immediately and have a very knowledgeable techie take a look. Clicking would probably mean actual physical damage and having it powered up could make it worse.

You could send it off for recovery, e.g. Drive Savers is a well-known one located in northern CA. But it won't be cheap, probably at least a couple of hundred dollars, could run well over a thousand, it depends on what is wrong and what you want recovered. They will give you an estimate for free if you are willing to send them the drive.

Hope you can get at least some of it back.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Five years is quite old for a hdd. I have become paranoid-strict about backups, but only because I learned the hard way, which was double-triple embarrassing as I was responsible for this stuff at work.

Can you boot your PC from something else? eg a Linux thumb drive or CD. That would enable you to see if you can see and copy off data from your drive. But I am long since retired from the techie world, and didn't keep in practice, so I won't attempt to offer any further advice.

Except this, because it is vital: Do nothing, eg recovery attempts, etc, that writes to the same disk. A lot of people do that with recovery software and ruin their chances with data that could have been saved.

All the best. Even with no data loss a full re-installation is a pain in the neck.

 

[bdbits]

Yes I learned the hard way also, and still do technology for a living though not much on the admin side these days.

And don't forget your mobile devices. If you don't either copy things off to a computer or have them set to back up all your pictures to cloud storage, well... mobile devices fail too.

 

[WNG]

Sorry to hear about hard drive woes! What ironic timing if it was a Windows 7 PC, given 1/14 was the day Microsoft stops support.
If the PC isn't getting pass the BIOS stage, then the HDD has a major failure, if you're getting a Blue Screen of Death upon initializing Windows, The OS portion may have suffered bad sectors if you're unable to boot after the limited recovery options within Windows.
There won't be any way to start it without a recent backup of the HDD. But you may be able to recover personal data if you can install it into another PC to access the HDD. (Or as Thad suggested, but that requires that you've already created a USB Linux boot stick. There is also a USB Windows PE boot version as well, that's free to download. If you have a laptop, you can still create a USB boot drive and give this a try.)

That's why it's vital to always have a redundant back up of any valuable data, and the operating system's partition. Most people devise a back up based on priorities. OS on one HDD, while personal data on a separate HDD. Each with a back up, copied periodically depending on importance of data.

Whenever you buy a HDD, always keep in mind, you need to buy at least a 2nd as a back up. There are plenty of apps that can automate your back up to a personal schedule.
Hmmm, 5 years isn't exactly a long time for a quality HDD to fail, unless it's had a very hard life as a server, ran hot, dropped often in a laptop, or gotten little maintenance.
I still have archival HDDs over 6-10 years old still spinning error-free. Be sure to keep HDDs running cool, and as vibration free as possible. And monitor their health with SMART data analysis apps. If they detect bad sector counts, it's a sign of possible total failure and time to replace the HDD if its for vital work. These will also reveal if your HDD has been running on the hot side. Ideally, for long life, its best to not exceed 40 C.

If this is the HDD in your HP desktop, pull the HDD and try to install it into another PC as a slave drive and attempt to access it. With any luck, you can still retrieve your data.
Good luck!

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Hmmm, 5 years isn't exactly a long time for a quality HDD to fail, unless it's had a very hard life as a server, ran hot, dropped often in a laptop, or gotten little maintenance.

Thinking about it, I do not recall many hdd failures back in my working days. Even in a small/mid office, that covered dozens of PC-years. On the other hand, upgrades were often ego driven, rather than driven by need, so equipment was passed on before stuff might have started to fail.

I haven't counted, but I think I have had two, maybe three, failures in the past ten years. That may seem a lot, but I do live in a tropical, dusty place.

I have a partition currently under suspicion. Which, ultimately, means the drive. I call someone in to do hardware: I no longer have the patience nor the thoroughness. Sadly, they don't have a linux guy, so I'm still left with that to do. By the way... One such thorough, old-school hardware guy showed me how one bad hdd was preventing the BIOS even loading. Which I didn't think was possible.

However confident I am of my backups ---and I am now--- I approach this kind of thing with fear. Hoping for some good news from @AlwaysOnAuto

 

[AlwaysOnAuto]

I'm back up, new Acer computer is working fine so far. I hot rodded it with 32gb of RAM. It came with a 4gb video card too so I think I'm set for a good while. Running an i7+ processor 8700 and the AMD Radeon RX 580X 4GB GDDRV card. Hope like heck this is the last computer I'll ever need to buy.
Got one for my wife too since the price was good. I'll put the 8gb of RAM I took out of mine in hers so she'll have 16gb. That should run her sewing programs OK once I get them loaded on and working, which should be a good chore.
Now to get rid of Norton and see what else is clogging up the arteries in this one.
I think the problem with the other computer was the power supply. I still have to hook up the cables I have for running the hdd's standalone thru this new computer. The old laptop didn't want to recognize the HDD but it's running XP so that doesn't surprise me.
We shall see, but I think I can still get my pictures off the old drive.

 

[AlwaysOnAuto]

YAHOO!
It worked!
Sure glad I'm a techy kind of guy. I think this would have been expensive if I weren't.
Whew, that is a load off my mind. I will sleep better tonight for sure.

 

[AlwaysOnAuto]

Canon PowerShot SD1000       6mm    f/2.8    1/60s    ISO 200

This is how I accessed the drives. I'll have to get a housing to put them in so I can use them till they're full.

 

[bdbits]

Awesome that you got your stuff back. That new one sounds like a beast of a computer, congratulations.

I'll put the 8gb of RAM I took out of mine in hers so she'll have 16gb.

Just a cautionary note, but if your old machine was old enough, putting its RAM in the new machine may negatively impact performance. Or not. Or not enough to notice, or having the additional RAM may outweigh a performance impact. It is hard to say for certain without access to the computers' and RAM specs.

 

[WNG]

Glad you were able to retrieve your data, and it went relatively painless. And nice new PC, btw.
If that case has provisions for fan(s) to cool the HDDs, I recommend adding one if it doesn't already have one installed.

 

[Tipton]

I used to make a lot of money out of recovering people's stuff off of their failed computers. Still do, occasionally. No one ever had a recent backup. As a consequence, I'm paranoid about having redundant backups.

I built my current computer from parts in 2012, it runs 24/7. No failures so far, so i can't justify a new one (I'm cheap). Only 8 gb RAM, so it takes some time to process 42megapixel files from my A7Rii.

Like I said, I'm paranoid about backups.

 

[AlwaysOnAuto]

Awesome that you got your stuff back. That new one sounds like a beast of a computer, congratulations.



Just a cautionary note, but if your old machine was old enough, putting its RAM in the new machine may negatively impact performance. Or not. Or not enough to notice, or having the additional RAM may outweigh a performance impact. It is hard to say for certain without access to the computers' and RAM specs.

Thanks.
The RAM I was referring to above is the one stick of new RAM that came in the new computer. I added it to my wife's new one and put brand new sticks in mine. The new one uses DDR4 RAM and the old one used DDR3 so I don't think it would have worked anyways.
I'm pretty happy with the new computer so far. It runs super quiet and has cooling fans. It's kind of cool when it starts it has a WHOOSH sound to it. So far, surfing the net, it seems a lot faster than my old one. It boots a heck of a lot quicker I can tell you that.

 

[AlwaysOnAuto]

I used to make a lot of money out of recovering people's stuff off of their failed computers. Still do, occasionally. No one ever had a recent backup. As a consequence, I'm paranoid about having redundant backups.

I built my current computer from parts in 2012, it runs 24/7. No failures so far, so i can't justify a new one (I'm cheap). Only 8 gb RAM, so it takes some time to process 42megapixel files from my A7Rii.

Like I said, I'm paranoid about backups.

I can't imagine processing files that big with only 8GB of RAM.
I learned long ago when I was teaching myself about computers (it's what I did when I got laid off back in '92) that RAM is the secret to running things fast, even with a slow processor. My first computer was a 386 with eventually 4mb of RAM. I got it to run AutoCad too. Took a while but I did it. Those were the days of monochrome 12" monitors too.
One other thing I've learned with this latest computer failure, my cameras are only bricks without a good computer to see the pictures with.

I need to come up with a good backup protocol.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

... I need to come up with a good backup protocol.

This is mine. It is fairly informal. Would not have passed muster back in the office...

I back up to an external portable disc whenever there is enough that I'd miss. I use a system that simply replaces new/changed files.

I have a second backup disc that gets swapped in when my wife makes her weekly visit to the friend who keeps it offsite for me. Full data backup gets done as soon as the offsite disk arrives onsite.

I have a third portable disc, which contains a backup of just my pics. Just... I had a spare portable disc.

I do a system backup from which I could reinstall my OS far less frequently, but... often enough.

The portable disks must never be connected to the PC when not actually being used. One doesn't want to loose the backup to the same power spike that took out the computer!

Always keep operating system and data on separate disks, or partitions, at least.

 

[bdbits]

I have 16G of RAM. I downloaded some sample A7Riii RAWs (42mp) to see if my computer and Capture One v12 would handle them ok. It was just fine, in fact I didn't really notice any difference in speed of processing than with my current A7ii files (24mp). I was surprised, actually. So I think I am set for a while yet. But I wholeheartedly agree with AlwaysOnAuto - Windows loves, loves, loves RAM. I monitored my usage for a while and found 8G was a bit tight. 16G seems to be plenty (Windows 10). There is point of diminishing returns of course, just depends on what you do with your computer and how much stuff you keep loaded up at a time.

I do have local backups at home. But nothing off-site yet. Does anyone use cloud-based backups? I refer to services like SpiderOak, IDrive, SugarSync, etc. I am not concerned with information leakage since with the ones I am looking at, data can be encrypted with a key I possess but the provider does not. So even law enforcement could not decrypt it (assuming the NSA does not have computational back doors or working quantum computers). Honestly, nothing to hide, its not the point. Anyway, if anyone has tried one or more of such services I for one would be interested in what you think of them.

 

[Ad Dieleman]

Does anyone use cloud-based backups? I refer to services like SpiderOak, IDrive, SugarSync, etc.

Maybe not strictly a backup service but I use it as such: Dropbox. I have the 3 TB plan. It runs flawlessly on my iMac (late 2015) and it has come to the rescue more than once to recover from user errors (also known as f*ckups on my part). I like that I can get to my files on all my devices and I also use it to share files to others.

 

[WNG]

Maybe not strictly a backup service but I use it as such: Dropbox. I have the 3 TB plan. It runs flawlessly on my iMac (late 2015) and it has come to the rescue more than once to recover from user errors (also known as f*ckups on my part). I like that I can get to my files on all my devices and I also use it to share files to others.

That is an interesting solution to use Dropbox and the like. But not cost effective in the USA, no thanks to bandwidth caps forced upon home users of ISP's. In recent years, big internet operators successfully lobbied politicians to eliminate 'unlimited bandwidth plans' and impose capped monthly plans with penalties. The FCC passed it for them. Sadly, the FCC's head under Trump has proposed that home owners should be imposed a return to modem speeds of no more than 10Mbps. And we must pay for greater bandwidth. It's crazy that we already have people paying over $200/month to cable companies for combined TV and ISP broadband services. (and the data plans are capped!)

Unless you're a commercial operation, you can't afford unlimited bandwidth cloud services.

 

[AlwaysOnAuto]

More good news on the new computer front. My old photo program was also loaded on my new one! No learning curve for it as it's an upgraded version but very similar to the old one.
I'm relieved as I didn't need more headaches at this time.