Failing hard drive

You can send the hard drive in and have the files extracted from the drive disc(s) but it is very expensive. Many website offer the recovery service for failed drives.

The clicking noise is possibly the reader arm skipping across the platters on your hard drive
a dirty hard first clean all of the dust from your computer using a fine air blower using a vacuum cleaner with no metal piping you might short your motherboard out if metal touches anything

or a fine air blower from a compressor making sure there is no MOISTURE in the air line then give the hard drive a firm tap on one side to free up the read arm
you could run the check disk utility

Click start run type cmd then type chkdsk/r/f which willscan for and attempt to repair any bad
sectors and automatically fix any corrupt files on your hard drive

then defragment your hard drive
don't do anything while the chkdsk utility is in progress any input may damage your computer

It might be power or data trying to get a connection make sure all power and data leads are securely attached

if this fails you might have a dirty hard driver with the reader arm skipping across the platters on your hard drive


give the hard drive a firm tap on the side to free up the reader arm you might be able to get it going long enough to salvage your data or it might go for a longer time


or you might use the freeze hard drive
http://lifehacker.com/170257/macgyver-tip--save-your-hard-drive-in-the-freezer

The clicking noise is possibly the reader arm skipping across the platters on your hard drive
a dirty hard first clean all of the dust from your computer using a fine air blower using a vacuum cleaner with no metal piping you might short your motherboard out if metal touches anything
or a fine air blower from a compressor making sure there is no MOISTURE in the air line then give the hard drive a firm tap on one side to free up the read arm
you could run the check disk utility
Click start run type cmd then type chkdsk/r/f which willscan for and attempt to repair any bad
sectors and automatically fix any corrupt files on your hard drive
then defragment your hard drive
don't do anything while the chkdsk utility is in progress any input may damage your computer
It might be power or data trying to get a connection make sure all power and data leads are securely attached

if this fails you might have a dirty hard driver with the reader arm skipping across the platters on your hard drive


give the hard drive a firm tap on the side to free up the reader arm you might be able to get it going long enough to salvage your data or it might go for a longer time


or you might use the freeze hard drive
http://lifehacker.com/170257/macgyver-tip--save-your-hard-drive-in-the-freezer

The clicking noise is possibly the reader arm skipping across the platters on your hard drive a dirty hard first clean all of the dust from your computer using a fine air blower using a vacuum cleaner with no metal piping you might short your motherboard out if metal touches anything or a fine air blower from a compressor making sure there is no MOISTURE in the air line then give the hard drive a firm tap on one side to free up the read arm you could run the check disk utility Click start run type cmd then type chkdsk/r/f which willscan for and attempt to repair any bad sectors and automatically fix any corrupt files on your hard drive then defragment your hard drive don't do anything while the chkdsk utility is in progress any input may damage your computer it might be power or data trying to get a connection make sure all power and data leads are securely attached

if this fails you might have a dirty hard driver with the reader arm skipping across the platters on your hard drive


give the hard drive a firm tap on the side to free up the reader arm you might be able to get it going long enough to salvage your data or it might go for a longer time


or you might use the freeze hard drive
http://lifehacker.com/170257/macgyver-tip--save-your-hard-drive-in-the-freezer

Hope this helps.

Your hard drive is failing, buy a new one and re-install soon then you might be able to salvage any files you need on the old one. If you keep using the failing one you will eventually be left with a "brick" and then file recovery will be very, very expensive if at all possible.

This means that the hard drive in the computer is failing. You can take it into an Apple store to have the hard drive replaced. Unfortunately, the data that is on the drive is rarely salvageable at this point.

Hello Pmtarq, hi, there are two possible bad part, first your hard drive is really bad, you need to reformat your drive, all data will be lost. (this is the common solution) or second the device electronics is bad, you can not do anything if the device fails, all you can do is salvage the hard drive. (this is a long shot, but possible)

The hard drive has been damaged and is now defective. It has 2 drives so it may be possible to salvage one of the drives. This is why i always recommend the 2.5" drives because they are made to handle a lot more shock. A standard hard drive is not meant to take any shock at all especially in use.
Thanks,
Lee

some of the files will still be there... depends on how much data was copied ....

the software i have successfully used before is called STELLAR PHOENIX although there are many other similar programs i am sure. some may be shareware though this one is not....

this program will look for the data string that occurs at the start of a photo or mp3 or document and try to salvage it...

google the phoenix

good luck, its complicated to use but does work...

very important not to save anything else on the drive. the more you use that drive the less you will salvage...

please rate if useful

If computer starts up all the way in safe mode, you have a better chance of salvaging this system.
If not, the hard drive may be crashed (physical damage, scraping oxide from the platters).
Worst case, you would have to replace hard drive and re-install windows and everything else.
Best case, a repair function can be done from a winXP CD that will replace windows files without erasing anything else.

If there is precious data on the hard drive, a data recovery may be in order.
I can provide a reliable and reasonable source for this service if needed.