External hard drive

[Robert]

If it is locking up after a certain amount of TIME it might be a heat issue. In that case some heavy-duty cooling might let it run long enough to rescue the relevant files.

Is it the kind that plugs in via a USB port, or the kind that's an internal on a "rack" sort of mount?
Either way, I have to agree with the above posts, it doesn't sound good. Usually when a HD stops booting it's dead.

It's a USB port.

Perhaps saying that it doesn't boot is not entirely correct. It does turn on but seams to freeze at some point.

Robert

It does the same when started up cold. The freeze happens about 5 or less seconds from turning on.

Robert

[Boggy Man]

It does the same when started up cold. The freeze happens about 5 or less seconds from turning on.

Robert

Perhaps it is a failure of some electronic component, causing it to stop functioning when a charge builds up somewhere. The disk itself, with the data on it, may still be intact, if that is the case.

[bbjohn]

Oh boy. I agree with everyone else that this doesn't sound good. As someone who has found that computers like to pick on him, I can honestly say you cannot win a war of wills with a computer. I have a big old iMac, and it's probably just as well. If I had a laptop, I might be inclined to attempt records for long-distance computer throwing. I recall we had a printer at work for a time which was much better suited as a boat anchor.

I would recommend you seek professional advice. I'd contact the manufacturer or the store you bought it from and ask them. They may not be able to help you much, but perhaps they could steer you in the right direction.

I back-up my artwork on CDs when I can. That way, I know I'll have copies in case my computer crashes.

I wish I could do more to help you. Believe me,everyone who's ever battled with a misbehaving computer can sympathize. Sometimes, computers can be even more frustrating to work with than my cat!

Big Bad John

[rickyj]

Here are two possible ideas for you. Apparently there is an old "secret" that not many know of to get a drive working again and that is to freeze it. I just read a web article where many people said they were able to get their drive working again for up to 2 hours after putting it into the freezer for a few hours. The theory is that it "shrinks" contacts in there or something, I didnt read the whole article, but a lot of people swear it works. Why not try it i guess? My only wonder is if it could ruin it if you did decide to send it to a recovery service or something.
The other thing is that if you are going to give up to chuck it out, I suggest as a last resort whacking it with your hand. Slap it a few times. You'll have to remove the enclosure first though. You want to hit the actual drive, but the top part, not the bottom part where all of the chips are exposed. People have said that sometime that works, because it "frees up" a possible stuck part in there. I would only do this before you decide you might toss it because hitting the drive can definitely ruin it too.

[Robert]

Update:

The hard drive is still not working however:

After downloading the raw footage again, using the recapture program, the original project read the raw footage on both "Roanoke" and "Return of the Bog Witch" saving me a lot of re editing time that I was not looking forward to. So... The same thing should work for the other projects.

The Dark Side lll may be released on time after all !!! Raaaaa!! (and there was much rejoicing)

Robert

[AyaneMatrix]

You mentioned that it was/is a Maxtor external drive in your first post, but is it gray and stores around 320GB of data? If it is, then it could be as simple as the power supply adapter port being messed up as it's something that happened to my external recently. You can play with the power cable to see if comes on or get another adapter with the same rating to see if it's something else. Though, the only other solution might be to break open the case and transfer the hard drive to your desktop and see if it works there, then put it into another usb external kit.

[Robert]

Update #2

I put the hard drive into another enclosure ... same thing... computer says it's there but no Icon appears in "My computer" window and I can't access it. There is a lot of clicking noises and it sometimes freezes the computer it is attached to.

I am ready to try freezing it..lol

Robert

[Mynock]

Loud clicking noises means it's almost surely busted. If you really want to salvage what's on it, I'd stop playing around with it and send it to a data recovery company.

[water_bug_62208]

Concur with Mynock. My old faithful Gateway of almost 10 years finally gave out, and it took an IT guy to salvage what was on the hard drive onto a DVD. You may want to consider that before the hard drive is too far gone.

[rickyj]

Here is a link about freezing a hard drive:
http://www.datarecoverypros.com/hard-dr ... reeze.html
The bottom of the article also gives ideas of recovery by hitting it and even dropping it.

I personally don't think it will work in this case though. If you're reporting clicking coming from it and it stops and starts the drive is probably not going to be useable anymore.