retrieving data from 7 year old laptop HDD

[su:bhatta]

Dear All,

I used a laptop from 2006-2010, it had a 2.5" 80GB SATA HDD. Then I was using WinXP.
The HDD had the following partitions:
C for WinXP, D,E & F for data....

I have not used the HDD for last 3 years, as my laptop broke down, some problem with powerchip, & such old parts are not available anymore...

I have recently acquired a HDD external case and tried to retrieve the data from the said drive....

There was no response from the HDD at first, after warming up for 30 minutes, there were sounds like that of the HDD running...

Ubuntu 13.04 couldn't read it in the end....

Any ideas on how to retrieve the data from that drive?
Any pathways will be of great help as I have a lot of important data just lying on that disk.....

[mr-woof]

Have you tried any other hard drives in the external drive case? I know my cheap one can be a bit iffy at times

Have you got a desktop? Connect the drive as the second drive and see if you can read it from there?

[mips]

If you have a desktop connect it directly to a sata port.

What does sudo fdisk -l give you with the drive connected?

[su:bhatta]

Thanks for the replies...
I do not have a desktop with me anymore, but that can be arranged this weekend... am surely gonna try that..

I do not have any more laptop HDD's with me to try that china made case so i dont know if that is flawed...(all i can say is that the power light shows on i.e. it is glowing red)
Here is the result of sudo fdisk -l:

Disk /dev/sda: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders, total 976773168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xa33b6c03

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *          63    84198054    42098996    7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
Partition 1 does not start on physical sector boundary.
/dev/sda2       168072032   976768064   404348016+   7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda3        84199422   168071167    41935873    5  Extended
Partition 3 does not start on physical sector boundary.
/dev/sda5       158072832   168071167     4999168   82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6        84199424   158072470    36936523+  83  Linux

Partition table entries are not in disk order

    There is a valid Mac label on this disk.
    Unfortunately fdisk(1) cannot handle these disks.
    Use either pdisk or parted to modify the partition table.
    Nevertheless some advice:
    1. fdisk will destroy its contents on write.
    2. Be sure that this disk is NOT a still vital
       part of a volume group. (Otherwise you may
       erase the other disks as well, if unmirrored.)


Disk /dev/mapper/cryptswap1: 5119 MB, 5119148032 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 622 cylinders, total 9998336 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes

                  Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System

That 500GB is my current laptop HDD....

The HDD is running, its making periodic click-click sound, thatz all i can say...

[stalkingwolf]

i have at times had issues with external adapters. sometimes changing the usb port has helped

[CharlesA]

Clicking usually means a head crash and it's unlikely the data on the drive is accessible.

As far as recovering the data, I guess you could try the whole "put drive in freezer" and then try to access your data, but that procedure is a bit iffy at best.

If you really want that data, you'll probably have to pay for a data recovery service to take a look at it, which can be quite expensive.

[mips]

As far as recovering the data, I guess you could try the whole "put drive in freezer" and then try to access your data, but that procedure is a bit iffy at best.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=ad1uVAB5bNA

[CharlesA]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=ad1uVAB5bNA

Haha. I've never put much faith in that whole freezer thing, but I guess if it works, it works, otherwise you still have a dead drive.

@OP: Backups are your friend.

[mips]

Haha. I've never put much faith in that whole freezer thing, but I guess if it works, it works, otherwise you still have a dead drive.

Thing is you might have some luck but the damage could be way worse. If you really have to try this then stick the drive in a bag with a lot of silica gel packs to absorve the moisture & then add another 2 vacuum sealed bags after that.

The issue here is spindle motor stiction and when you cool it down the tolerances become a bit better and the drive might start up. Ideally in this scenario you should do a platter swap to a donor drive chassis but you need the right tools & environment to this in.

[su:bhatta]

Thing is you might have some luck but the damage could be way worse. If you really have to try this then stick the drive in a bag with a lot of silica gel packs to absorve the moisture & then add another 2 vacuum sealed bags after that.

The issue here is spindle motor stiction and when you cool it down the tolerances become a bit better and the drive might start up. Ideally in this scenario you should do a platter swap to a donor drive chassis but you need the right tools & environment to this in.

Thanks for all suggestions,

but that freezer thing I am not really considering, I will first try connecting the drive to the desktop, this Sunday. Pray that it works. Else I will get the Data recovery done.

I also have client related information as well as plain personal data, pictures n videos on that HDD...

so itz kinda dear to me...

If all else fails, I might and I say, I just Might toss it in the freezer and see what happens...