Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Creative Data Loss

Posted by timothy on from the do-it-just-like-not-this dept.

lewiz writes "An interesting article from the BBC about the crazy things people do when they accidentally delete files. Amazingly one guy froze his hard disk in an effort to retrieve files. Real men don't make backups... but, hell, who needs to if you can resurrect them from the dead ;)"

8 of 350 comments (clear)

  1. Dang it... by Kenja · · Score: 5, Funny

    I had a witty well worded rsponse to this article but I forgot to hit 'submit'. Could the admins please recover it for me and place it in the first post position?

    --

    "Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
  2. Hard Drive in the Freezer by vlauria · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I actually did that on a WD scsii hard drive last year. It failed on me and had important data on it. I wasn't willing to shill out a few hundred to a few grand to get it fixed, so I found a few articles commenting about how the clicking noise I was hearing was problems related to the mechanics of the drive and there was a chance I could salvage my hard drive by placing in the freezer.

    I thought, "Well, the data is lost anyway, so why not?" I put it in a ziplock bag, so not to get the platters all frosty, and left it in overnight. I woke up the next morning and put it back into my computer, and wouldn't you know it, absolutly nothing except for the same clicking errors I heard the day before.

    Thanks Internet, you've once again provided me with more information that I really needed.

    1. Re:Hard Drive in the Freezer by wirelessbuzzers · · Score: 5, Informative

      If the drive was stictioned, depending on the lubricant, a decent way to rescue it might be

      1) Heat the drive above room temperature. I'm not saying boil it; I put one of those chemical hand-warmers on mine and left it in a box for a while. This should heat it to around 40C.

      2) Connect it to your computer, but leave the drive itself out on a desk. May require some monkeying with your case to let it run while open.

      3) Turn the computer on. If the drive still clicks when it tries to spin up, tap it on the corner (in a way that would spin the drive if you hit it harder). The idea is to provide some torque to break the static friction of the lubricant and get it spun up.

      I rescued (part of) a hard drive this way last year. I didn't get all the data off it, but at least I managed to retrieve /, /var and /etc. The /usr partition got read errors, possibly due to my whacking the disk.

      --
      I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
  3. Re:What's wrong with freezing a drive? by gantrep · · Score: 5, Insightful

    it'll help a dead drive work, if there's some problem with the controller board where maybe contraction from cold will cause some broken microscopic trace to conduct again, but it won't help you recover data you *deleted* as the guy in the blurb did.

  4. The freezer trick does work though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I personally HAVE recovered files using the freezer trick... I managed to salvage the data from a dead IBM Deathstar, a "click of death" WD 20 gigger, a 60gb maxtor which refused to spin up, and a 3.5gb maxtor which wouldnt come up in bios... I find it somewhat dumb that they are dissing the freezer trick, as for dying hdd's it actually works.

  5. Project E.U.N.U.C.H. by darth_silliarse · · Score: 5, Funny

    The funniest computer freezing experiment I have seen is this one. Still makes me giggle looking at the site....

    --
    I've noticed that everyone who is for abortion has already been born - Ronald Reagan
  6. Resurrection? What about reincarnation? by AndroidCat · · Score: 5, Funny

    If data can be resurrected from the dead, do I have to worry about it later reincarnating on someone else's new drive? That could be quite a security risk! How do I metaphysically protect my data?

    --
    One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
  7. Google Desktop Search to the rescue by ZeroTrace · · Score: 5, Informative
    I found myself in a predicament a few weeks ago where I had just finished adding three pages to a term paper and went to back it up to my USB drive. Needless to say, I somehow managed to delete the file and corrupt the copy on the USB drive. As I was frantically thinking about solutions I glanced down at the taskbar clock to see how much time I had before it was due.

    At this point one of my tray icons caught my attention... Google Desktop Search. I had been playing with it for a few days and remembered the caching functionality. I opened it up and did a search for the file. Magically, it appeared with a cache and the entire document, in all of it's glory.

    This was proof enough for me that aside from the security concerns, desktop search tools do have distinct advantages. Especially instant backups :)