Failing HDD: Which Data Recovery Program Is Best?

[sillybuttons]

Hello, thank you so much for reading my message! I really need your help!

I have an old IDE drive that I was using to store lots of files important to me. Just as I bought a USB flash stick to back it up, it began failing.

When I try to access many files from the disk, it takes a long time, and often returns an error.

I know the disk is dying, I know that I will lose some of my data - but...

Please just tell me what is the best data recovery program available, so that I can plug this drive into an IDE external enclosure, run the program, and recover as much as possible before it dies completely.

Thank you so much!

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

I've had good experiences with Runtime Software's GetDataBack.

 

[Davros]

you'll have more success if you just try and reover your data not the whole disk
also why do you need an enclosure ? connecting it to an ide channel would be better
and if the enclosure is usb then it would take longer meaning the disk would be in use longer increasing the risk of it dying

 

[Bludd]

GetDataBack is good. +1

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

I used the recovery utility from acronis once. Worked perfect for me though I must add it was not a case of a complete hdd failure but instead Windows Install screwing up and deleting the whole data partition.

 

[Jawed]

I have an old IDE disk that's dead when it gets warm with symptoms that sound very similar to yours.

So try keeping your failing disk cool, e.g. if it's winter where you are put your open case near a window and place the disk outside of your case as close to the nice cold air as you can get it.

My attempts at killing that IDE disk for good, failed, i.e. smashing and dropping it while it was writing all failed I considered dropping it down several storeys but wasn't particularly keen to clean up the mess. So, ahem, it still works as long as it isn't warm

Jawed

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

If it's an overheating problem (bearings/motor), some people say you can put it in a plastic bag and stick it in the freezer for a few hours to give you time to get the data off. When I had an overheating drive failing many years back, I used a bag of frozen peas as a heatsink until I rescued the data.

 

[Davros]

Thats nothing I used a hard drive to rescue a bag of frozen peas.....