KawaiiChica ([info]kawaii_chica) wrote in [info]computerhelp,
@ 2008-05-15 11:02:00
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Current mood: confused
Entry tags:hard drive, help

I looked but didn't see anything like this in tags.
Corrected

I just found out that the hard drive on my laptop is burned out, but I'm not even sure that's possible.

So I just have a few quick questions.

1- How does that happen?

2- Since I only just got my laptop last year (sadly last month the warranty ended), should I buy a whole new laptop or just replace the hard drive?

3- Is there any way to save some of the files on it? I'm mostly concerned about the many pictures I had saved onto the computer. (about 3 years worth)

I'd really appreciate your help!


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[info]happinessiseasy
2008-05-15 06:43 pm UTC (link)
What?

I've never heard of a hard drive on a battery before. Please clarify.

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[info]kawaii_chica
2008-05-15 07:09 pm UTC (link)
Sorry, my bad, I just meant my hard drive.

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[info]happinessiseasy
2008-05-15 07:51 pm UTC (link)
It's definitely more economical to replace the hard drive. If you can't do it yourself and don't know anyone else who can, you could get the place that sold it to you possibly to install it for you.

Did you back up any of your data? If not, can you boot at all, or is it totally dead? If you can boot at all, connect to a network and back up as soon as possible to avoid data loss. Otherwise you're probably gonna have to put the drive in as a slave and try to manually retrieve the readable portions.

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[info]kawaii_chica
2008-05-15 08:36 pm UTC (link)
I do have a friend who can change it for me, I'll ask him about backing up the files. Thank you!

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[info]nuclearninja
2008-05-16 02:09 am UTC (link)
Despite the fact it's on a laptop, laptop and desktop hard drives are constructed and operate in the same fashion.

A hard drive is a series of stacked magnetic platers (similar to a package of bologna). These platters are centered around a spindle... which is tied into a motor. This motor makes the platers spin at high speeds (usually 5800 to 7200 rpm), and a device called a head reads and writes data to the platters magnetically by sweeping over the platters back and fourth (the noise you hear when the hard drive is working).

This motor is running as long as the computer is on. Only condition it shuts off (outside of turning off the comp), is if you use the power saving settings to turn your hard drives off after a set time. What more than likely happened is this motor burned out. Since the platers aren't spinning, the head can't read all of the data on the disk.

It's much more economical to replace the hard drive over buying a new laptop.

As for recovery, you'll have to set the drive as a slave, or get an adapter for a USB enclosure, and hope it works enough to get it running again.

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[info]kawaii_chica
2008-05-16 09:21 pm UTC (link)
Wow, which explains the need for the fan. I am looking into my options for replacing it. I'm hoping he can still do a backup since it does let you go into the basic code (which I don't understand but my friend does).

Thank you for the help and info!

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[info]shadohrt
2008-05-23 03:46 pm UTC (link)
If you can boot into DOS (I assume that is what you mean by "basic code") then your disk is probably not dead at all... just a corrupted OS.

The disk itself may not need to be replaced... but your friend should be able to determine that.

Replacing the disk is probably very easy.... it definitely is if the disk is easy to get out.... replacing a 2002-2004 era iBook hard disk is NOT easy and, therefore, can be very expensive.... often easier to replace the laptop. That is just an example. Without knowing if your disk is easy to replace or not I couldn't say for your situation.

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