Support me some tech bitches (Hard drive dead, many wounded)

If you touch your software enough does it become hardware?

Moderator: Forum Moderators

Lateralus
Dr Zoidberg
Dr Zoidberg
Posts: 4217
Joined: May 15th, 2005, 15:20

Post by Lateralus »

Well bugger me sideways. I've managed to recover most of my photos, including ones from my graduation! :whew: Even got quite a lot of documents back too, although it would appear to mostly be useless/old ones rather than the ones I'd have liked, but hey ho.

That GDB tool is the computing equivilent of witchcraft. I have no idea how it recovers stuff from a reformat, but I'm damn gald it did! Cheers guys. :ahoy:
Dr. kitteny berk
Morbo
Morbo
Posts: 19676
Joined: December 10th, 2004, 21:53
Contact:

Post by Dr. kitteny berk »

Formatting is the same as deleting stuff* - it doesn't overwrite anything, just makes a note that nothing is there any more.



*Apart from low level formatting (can you even still do that?) and formatting to different file systems (still doesn't overwrite, but does fuck stuff up)
eion
Grammar Nazi
Grammar Nazi
Posts: 1511
Joined: March 18th, 2006, 22:23
Location: Beijing
Contact:

Post by eion »

Dr. kitteny berk wrote:Formatting is the same as deleting stuff* - it doesn't overwrite anything, just makes a note that nothing is there any more.



*Apart from low level formatting (can you even still do that?) and formatting to different file systems (still doesn't overwrite, but does fuck stuff up)
:above: This-ish - it depends on your MFT being at least somewhat intact, though, I believe. And there's some magic too. Glad to hear it mostly worked out in this case.

(Low-level format is obviously still possible, but almost never advisable. Basically if you get a power cut etc. at the wrong time during a repartition/full format, you might need a low-level format, but that's about the only time I can think of when you might need one).
cheeseandham
Shambler In Drag
Shambler In Drag
Posts: 780
Joined: March 16th, 2007, 20:22
Location: on the sofa
Contact:

Post by cheeseandham »

AFAIK, low level format went out a long time ago with upgrades to IDE electronics and a low level format -if managed- can actually ruin a drive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_formatting
eion
Grammar Nazi
Grammar Nazi
Posts: 1511
Joined: March 18th, 2006, 22:23
Location: Beijing
Contact:

Post by eion »

cheeseandham wrote:AFAIK, low level format went out a long time ago with upgrades to IDE electronics and a low level format -if managed- can actually ruin a drive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_formatting
The last time I had to low-level format a hard drive was in the year 2000 I believe. A friend of mine (seriously) was formatting a hard disk in his heavily-overclocked Abit BP6/dual celery machine, and it went pthunk part-way through. The drive then refused to be formatted in the normal way. Fortunately another friend's mobo (don't remember the model, but it was a BX-based board) had a low-level format utility in the BIOS, after which the disk worked fine.
cheeseandham
Shambler In Drag
Shambler In Drag
Posts: 780
Joined: March 16th, 2007, 20:22
Location: on the sofa
Contact:

Post by cheeseandham »

eion wrote:
The last time I had to low-level format a hard drive was in the year 2000 I believe.
Yup, 7 years would qualify as "a long time ago" in my book :P
IMHO that was a lucky fix though (note I'm not saying it wasn't a good one!) and caught in the last generation of available low-level formattedness.

I had an Abit BP6 too, ahh what a great mobo that was...
eion
Grammar Nazi
Grammar Nazi
Posts: 1511
Joined: March 18th, 2006, 22:23
Location: Beijing
Contact:

Post by eion »

cheeseandham wrote:I had an Abit BP6 too, ahh what a great mobo that was...
:above: This. It was such a great board that I actually bought my friend's one off of him.
cashy
Zombie
Zombie
Posts: 2024
Joined: May 9th, 2005, 19:43
Location: shropshire

Post by cashy »

I may have attempted this drunk, and i may of switched my hard drives around with the PC still on.
Also, i may be posting this from a laptop. LOL
Dog Pants
Site Moderator
Site Moderator
Posts: 21653
Joined: April 29th, 2005, 13:39
Location: Surrey, UK
Contact:

Post by Dog Pants »

:faint:
pixie pie
Cheese Lord
Cheese Lord
Posts: 838
Joined: July 30th, 2005, 23:46
Location: Cambridge, UK

Post by pixie pie »

cashy wrote:I may have attempted this drunk, and i may of switched my hard drives around with the PC still on.
Also, i may be posting this from a laptop. LOL
You sir, deserve a medal :)
Post Reply