My laptop has died. When I turn it on it sounds like it is starting up but the nothing on the screen comes up. I have to send it in to Hewlett Packard with the service plan, but I want to try and retrieve my data before I do so. Best Buy "The Geek Squad" said they could take out the hard drive and try to retireve the files by putting it into another computer...but it would cost $100. I only want the "My documents" section of my hard drive, so I do not want to pay that much. Best Buy also was not sure if the information was already erased, so it might just be a lost cause. However, I would be willing to pay like $25 for someone who has the equipment to take my hard drive and try to find the documents. So send me a message if you are interest, thanks!

6/23/2006 9:15:15 PM

Thank you for reminding me I need to get my manager to let us get a USB enclosure for laptop drives for when shit like that happens to our customers.

But yeah, that's all you'll need. You could pick one up yourself at tiger direct for about that much and your old laptop drive would look just like any other usb harddrive to whatever machine you hooked it up to. Hell, it might be worth it for you to try doing it yourself just so you'll have the equipment if it happens again and know what to do. Just make sure you get the right one for your kind of harddrive. SATA or IDE that is.

6/23/2006 9:28:21 PM

IDE or SATA hard drive? Unless your system is fairly new, I'm assuming IDE...

Like he said above... I have the hardware that can connect any IDE Laptop HD through USB. If you need help then let me know.



[Edited on June 23, 2006 at 9:31 PM. Reason : edit]

6/23/2006 9:30:36 PM

OK, so how do I know what kind of hard drive I have? Can I use the USB enclosure thing if my computer wont even turn on? (I am using a friends computer right now)

6/23/2006 9:39:46 PM

Take out your harddrive and match it to these pictures:

IDE - has connection with bunch of pins


SATA - has two main connections



To get your "My Documents" files off the hard drive, you're going to HAVE to use your friends computer AGAIN And borrow some of his/her hard drive space for now.

[Edited on June 23, 2006 at 9:57 PM. Reason : edit]

6/23/2006 9:53:49 PM

So I guess I have an IDE hard drive. So what am I supposed to do with the hard drive when I take it out?

6/23/2006 10:08:05 PM

the cheapest thing is to get a laptop ide to desktop ide converter and hook the laptop drive up to a desktop and transfer the files to the desktop. send me a PM if you need some help doing this or if you want me to do if you live in raleigh. I have a laptop/destop ide converter and I am around this weekend.

6/23/2006 11:00:44 PM

maybe a NoOb suggestion but i had this same problem and it wasn't that my "laptop died" it was just the screen died. hence, before you waste money (if the power light stays on when you power it up) Just borrow someone's monitor, hook it up to your computer, swap display to an external monitor- should be little blue function key-hold down and hit either F5 or F9 (one with little computer/) until your display comes up on external. Then you can just save to external hard drive or network to another pc.

hope this might help- good luck

6/23/2006 11:13:49 PM

Bestbuy already diagnosed the problem.

Way to waste more space though with your response, good job.

kerbear114: This is why you BACK UP REGULARLY. The chances of recovering your data aren't all that good, and a hundred bucks to do it is an absolute STEAL.

6/24/2006 12:17:14 AM

^ an external harddrive is almost a mandatory accesory for a laptop if the laptop is your primary system.

by the way, anyone have any brand/model recomendations for external drives and/or enclosure kits? I want to make sure we carry some decent and cheap ones that the bookstore.

but yeah, as noen said, backing up is pretty damned important, and even more so for laptop owners. I mean if you know the physics and engineering behind a harddrive you know those things were never really meant to move in the first place.

[Edited on June 24, 2006 at 2:52 AM. Reason : ]

6/24/2006 2:50:14 AM

^^ best buy did not look at the comp. and figure out the problem. he called and explained his situation and they gave him an estimate.

fuck off

6/24/2006 5:20:55 AM

kerbear114: basically if the hard drive itself is messed up, you can't really recover the data unless you send the drive to a data recovery place that will charge more than $500 just to try to access the data. But, if the computer is not booting for some other reason, you should be able to access the hard drive by putting it in another pc and copying the data over.

6/24/2006 9:54:19 AM

Damn, NOBODY on here local to Raleigh has the equipment + is willing to help this person out? (I could make a killing if I was in Raleigh still...).

kerbear, as has been mentioned, go to a local electronics/computer store, tell them you need an "external usb enclosure for a 2.5" laptop hard drive". If the associate looks at you funny, walk away and go to the somebody else. Look up documentation on HP's website for how to remove the hard drive from your laptop. Put in external enclosure, plug into your friends computer ... either the drive will be recognized or it won't be. If it is, send the laptop back for repair WITHOUT the hard drive in it.

Good luck.

6/24/2006 10:16:52 AM

Good god people. (btw Perlith ftw, cuz he's right)

My external laptop HD enclosure is with my mother right now b/c her laptop was being screwy, I can see if she's done with it yet.

I'll take your laptop out, put it in said enclosure, and hook it up to another computer (like my laptop).
We can then burn a CD or DVD of your data if the harddrive isn't corrupted.

Alternatively if you have a desktop, harddrives are more reliable than CD/DVD burning, we can hook it up to that and just transfer the data off.

if noone else can help you, you've got a PM with my cell phone, i'll call up my mother today/tommorow to try and get my enclosure back.

On a seperate note, if you dont want to wait for me to get it back, one can be bought at tiger direct that's not the greatest but will do for the purpose for $10. If you really dont know what you're doing I'll be happy to pick it up and buy it for you if you'll pay me back for it. (you keep it of course)

And yes, i'll help you for the $25, and no charge if the data is truly gone.


[Edited on June 24, 2006 at 10:56 AM. Reason : .]

6/24/2006 10:53:27 AM

you don't need an enclosure.

http://h30094.www3.hp.com/product.asp?sku=2353516&jumpid=ex_r2910_pricegrabbersmb/storage

is all you need and you can get them at intrex, connectit, tigerdirect, etc for $cheap

6/24/2006 12:14:04 PM

That'd work if the second computer was a desktop and had a free bay. A usb enclosure is a more general solution to the problem since it'll work on anything from an g5 powermac to an inspiron laptop.

6/24/2006 12:29:53 PM

I have a 2.5in usb enclosure you can use, or I can burn your files to a dvd. I ask for a 6 pack for my trouble

6/24/2006 2:33:22 PM

I'm doubting her drive was fat32, so an apple isn't reading it

my suggestion was more one of frugality since this is (hopefully) a one time deal

[Edited on June 24, 2006 at 3:03 PM. Reason : you take ^ on his offer]

6/24/2006 3:02:42 PM

Apples can read NTFS.

6/24/2006 3:35:31 PM

look

Dont let anybody charge you money for this

Go to a place like intrex, ask for a conversion kit for your laptop hdd to desktop. Its about 7 dollars and some change (the last time I bought one at least) and just hook it up to another computer

But it sounds like your hdd may be the problem.

6/24/2006 4:41:27 PM

edit:

Quote :

"Reading from NTFS disks seems to be very stable now in 10.4.1+. Writing to NTFS disks still isn't possible; all NTFS disks are mounted "read only.""

good call Charybdisjim

[Edited on June 24, 2006 at 5:07 PM. Reason : I knew *nix could, but didnt think it was stable enough for apple to support it yet]

6/24/2006 5:06:41 PM

Noen - the $100 fee sounds like all GeekSquad was going to do was stick the drive in an enclosure to see if it was readable, i highly doubt GeekSquad is capable of data "recovery" in which case $100 is expensive.

FYI - My dad had laptop hard drive issues, GeekSquad came out and told them it would be $300 to fix it and told him his hard drive was bad. I told him to wait til I came home to look at it. Got home, diagnosed the drive, (file table corruption), reformatted and his computer was like new. Cost $0. Also I told him he should upgrade to a newer higher rpm drive, cost $70. That means he would have spent $230 in labor fees and it wasn't even required to fix the problem... I can't believe people assume that GeekSquad's diagnosis' are always right. They only care about bottom line, what's the quickest, easiest way to "work around" the problem and upcharge for it, not taking into account of trying to save the customer money by fixing the problem at hand. (assuming they diagnosis the right problem)

[Edited on June 24, 2006 at 5:52 PM. Reason : .]

6/24/2006 5:43:14 PM

i have a 300 gb sata just sitting on my desk collecting dust

6/24/2006 6:17:49 PM

Quote :

"Damn, NOBODY on here local to Raleigh has the equipment + is willing to help this person out? (I could make a killing if I was in Raleigh still...)."

I already offered to help like 5 posts before you said that.

6/24/2006 6:27:21 PM