External HD stops working after fall while in operation

I had one of your external hard drives and it fell while it was operating.

Since then, I cannot access my data.

As far as I’ve seen, I cannot even read the raw data of it’s sectors, so it seems that the reading head was damaged or sth…

What I want to know is this:

  • What could be wrong? (Is it the reading head)

  • Could this be fixed or save some of my data? (Please provide technical detail on how. I don’t want to send it to you to fix it.)

  • Why the heck do you put the ‘legs’ of the external drives on its narrowest side?

Hello Crash45, sorry to hear that you cannot access your files, hard drives are very sensitive to physical damage, in some cases if you try to recover your information it can damage your files even more. This is why professional help is recommended.

http://support.wdc.com/recovery/index.asp?wdc_lang=en

You can also contact WD support directly for assistance.

http://support.wdc.com/contact/index.asp?lang=en

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Hello.

I don’t think my warranty is active anymore (so I have nothing to lose).

Also, I don’t trust my data to other people and don’t like the process of sending stuff to other people.

In addition, I enjoy fixing things and don’t care if they die on my hands (usually they don’t, unless they are supposed to die anyway).

Please, share instructions on what could be wrong and how I could fix that.

(As far as I remember, it sems that the platters are spinning and I can hear the reading head move, but I can read no data out of the sectors)

The only thing left for me to do with your HD is to open it. :smiley:

I have even found some stuff to prepare my eyes with:

http://hddscan.com/doc/HDD_from_inside.html

Hi again, Hard drive repairs are not supported by WD, but you can share information with the other community users. See the following link for an example. 

http://community.wd.com/t5/Desktop-Mobile-Drives/Internal-hard-disk-unable-to-repair/m-p/525699/highlight/true#M11692

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Typically when a disk falls, the first internal parts to break are the heads, and if the disk is in use, the heads usually scratch the platter in a head crash.

So… This means opening up the disk and replacing heads. And then having the knowledge to use tools to work & read around the damaged area. If the heads are busted just-so, and you use the disk, you can be they’re scraping more than one tiny section. In that case your disk and data are pretty much a gonner.

Recommendation is to seek professional help. I mean, like, sure, you can try fixing things yourself, but DIY in this situation never works. You can trust pro level help, they generally don’t snoop through your data much, keep in mind they HAVE to look at some things to verify the recovery process worked alright.

Lessons for the future: 2 copies of important data at all times, on different physical disks. That way, when one breaks, you got a fallback position. And a damaged disk becomes a mere inconvenience, not a catastrophe.

Crash45 wrote:

I had one of your external hard drives and it fell while it was operating.

Since then, I cannot access my data.

As far as I’ve seen, I cannot even read the raw data of it’s sectors, so it seems that the reading head was damaged or sth…

 

What I want to know is this:

  • What could be wrong? (Is it the reading head)
  • Could this be fixed or save some of my data? (Please provide technical detail on how. I don’t want to send it to you to fix it.)
  • Why the heck do you put the ‘legs’ of the external drives on its narrowest side?

 

To directly answer your questions:

What could be wrong:

Most likely head crash, damaged heads and scratched platter(s).

Could this be fixed or save some of my data?

The problem can sometimes be fixed, temporarily, in a laboratory environment. The amount of information and technical know-how, to fix this, is way beyond the scope of general internet message boards. Not to mention the need for equipment that can run into thousnds of dollars. A recovery specialist will make repairs as best as possible and then use tools to work around damaged areas and recover what’s left, assuming the platters aren’t scratched to high-heaven…

Why the heck do you put the ‘legs’ of the external drives on its narrowest side?

I assume it’s a MyBook. It’s all about marketing and looks and appearances. In today’s tech world, form and marketing often take precedence over practicality and usability. Things haven’t gotten better since the trend started in the 1990’s. I do, however, recall the first MyBook series came with rubber stick-on pads that let you position the disk flat on its side. But according to some marketing “brainchild” it looked stupid that way. Not to mention the hundreds of thousands of dollars the company saved by switching to a different housing and not having to include the 4 sticky rubber feet/bumpers.

It’s like why do peripherals have rounded topsides, the stuff looks like it was left out in the sun and got half-baked. Melted and rounded. Same thing applies with the glossy finish. You either handle these products with cloth gloves or accept the fact that they will get scratched up and look like **bleep** in a year. Or even those rubberized products that become oily and gooey after about 5 years. So much for brilliant marketing. Give me square products with a nice solid matte & flat finish.