Two questions

[Ritterskoop]

#1, does anyone know anyone who does disk data recovery? I have an external hard drive that wants to spin up but won't quite. The first place I checked with, who actually looked at it, quoted me $1800.

It's jpegs and mp3s, nothing worth that much. I was thinking more around $300.

I tried the home remedies - freezing the drive, rapping it, twisting it while it's trying to spin up. That one held promise but I couldn't keep twisting it.

So if you know anyone, please let me know.

#2, what would be a good gift for a soldier who just lost the grandmother who mostly raised him, but who they can't let go home? The unit I send stuff to is in Afghanistan.

[peacock2121]

No answer for the first question

Second question -

This is filtered through who 'grandmas' are for me. I'd send cookies and knitted items. Grandmas bake and knit.

[Ritterskoop]

This is filtered through who 'grandmas' are for me. I'd send cookies and knitted items. Grandmas bake and knit.

That's perfect, thanks. Even if his grandma didn't bake or knit, he'll still like cookies, and the sergeant said it's getting cold now, so I will find something comforting knitted.

[PlacentiaSoccerMom]

#2, what would be a good gift for a soldier who just lost the grandmother who mostly raised him, but who they can't let go home? The unit I send stuff to is in Afghanistan.

Phone cards. The cheapest that I have found are a Wal-Mart or Sam's Club. Make sure that they can be used overseas.

Pop Tarts. When Jeff's friend Dave served in Iraq, we sent him large containers of Pop Tarts. Apparently they are like gold overseas.

[Ritterskoop]

Most of them have internet access but I will ask about a phone card for this one guy, thanks.

[earendel]

#1, does anyone know anyone who does disk data recovery? I have an external hard drive that wants to spin up but won't quite. The first place I checked with, who actually looked at it, quoted me $1800.

It's jpegs and mp3s, nothing worth that much. I was thinking more around $300.

I don't have a company to recommend - I do know that our district has a contract for data recovery in cases where it's essential, but it is very expensive. That $1800 sounds about right.

[PlacentiaSoccerMom]

I got an email from the USO today. (I have bought care packages for them to send overseas and I am on their mailing list.)

The things they include in their packages might help with your gift:
USO will deliver a care package of requested items, including a prepaid international phone card, travel size toiletries, sunscreen, snacks and other requested items.

[15QuestionsAway]

#1, does anyone know anyone who does disk data recovery? I have an external hard drive that wants to spin up but won't quite. The first place I checked with, who actually looked at it, quoted me $1800.

It's jpegs and mp3s, nothing worth that much. I was thinking more around $300.

I tried the home remedies - freezing the drive, rapping it, twisting it while it's trying to spin up. That one held promise but I couldn't keep twisting it.

So if you know anyone, please let me know.

#2, what would be a good gift for a soldier who just lost the grandmother who mostly raised him, but who they can't let go home? The unit I send stuff to is in Afghanistan.

Re #1, I went through the same awful experience a few months ago. I'm assuming you're running some flavour of Windows.

Here's some ideas:

a: If it's the boot drive (main hard drive), you can try mounting it as a slave (secondary hard drive) on another machine running the same version of Windows. Assuming the disk is recognized when rebooting the other machine (check the BIOS settings), Windows will try to repair it.

Rereading your message though - it seems yours is an external drive. You may want to consider removing the drive from its enclosure and mounting it as a slave inside your PC using the ribbon cable that connects to your main hard drive. The ribbon cable should have another connector to mount a second hard drive - don't unmount your main hard drive.

I'm guessing the external hard drive is connected using USB 2.0 or FireWire, so the computer recognizes it the same way it would recognize a USB drive. Mounting the drive inside the computer using the ribbon cable changes the way the computer talks to the hard drive.

b: If it's doing the click-click-click thing, let it sit for a day or two trying to boot. When I took my failed drive in, the company tried that and the drive did manage to work after a while. Long enough to recover some of what was on it.

c: Try mounting it upside down (silver side facing the ground). Don't twist it, just leave it upside down.

If it doesn't work, freeze it overnight in a Ziploc bag and then mount it upside down. Since you're running an external drive, if you freeze, I don't mean the whole enclosure - just the disk drive itself.

The company I took it to was local and they quoted me $75/h for technician time and $1000-$1200 if they needed to take it to a clean room. I agreed to the former - letting them see what they could do first.

Good luck with this - bad hard drives are truly one of life's biggest pains in the ass.

As for #2, I've got nothing. PSM's suggestions look really good though.

[Ritterskoop]

I have the ribbon thing but there's nowhere on the Mac mini to hook it up. I did change the doohickey on the enclosure from master to slave, just for fun. But if it won't spin, I don't know how that would help. I wonder if I just need a new enclosure? But the tech guy would've said so, I guess. Unless he really needed that $1800.....

I looked at phone cards today at the grocery store. 250 domestic minutes was $15, which seems OK. I wonder if the international tradeoff is as good as 4-to-1, so he'd get an hour of time for the $15. I buy 8 hours for $20 on my Sprint card, which I don't use anymore but roomie needs it because we don't have long distance service on the landline.

[15QuestionsAway]

I have the ribbon thing but there's nowhere on the Mac mini to hook it up. I did change the doohickey on the enclosure from master to slave, just for fun. But if it won't spin, I don't know how that would help. I wonder if I just need a new enclosure? But the tech guy would've said so, I guess. Unless he really needed that $1800.....

I looked at phone cards today at the grocery store. 250 domestic minutes was $15, which seems OK. I wonder if the international tradeoff is as good as 4-to-1, so he'd get an hour of time for the $15. I buy 8 hours for $20 on my Sprint card, which I don't use anymore but roomie needs it because we don't have long distance service on the landline.

Didn't realize you had a Mac Mini. I have one that I use as my TV (using an EyeTV) and my DVR. I love it - I have a 500 GB external hard drive on mine as well, connected via FireWire. I'm not as up on OS X as Windows when it comes to repair.

Perhaps an Apple tech could mount your drive in a larger machine and diagnose it. If there's an Apple Store near you, that would be a good resource.

[Ritterskoop]

Perhaps an Apple tech could mount your drive in a larger machine and diagnose it. If there's an Apple Store near you, that would be a good resource.

I have such a store 3 miles from here. Good idea.

[cindy.wellman]

#1, does anyone know anyone who does disk data recovery? I have an external hard drive that wants to spin up but won't quite. The first place I checked with, who actually looked at it, quoted me $1800.

It's jpegs and mp3s, nothing worth that much. I was thinking more around $300.

I tried the home remedies - freezing the drive, rapping it, twisting it while it's trying to spin up. That one held promise but I couldn't keep twisting it.

So if you know anyone, please let me know.

#2, what would be a good gift for a soldier who just lost the grandmother who mostly raised him, but who they can't let go home? The unit I send stuff to is in Afghanistan.

I don't have any thing to add to the #1 question.

2) They didn't let him come home for the funeral? Maybe a video would be nice of his local area, to help with the homesickness he must be feeling. It would especially be nice if on that video other people he knows could send some hellos or other forms of communication.

All the usual stuff like homemade cookies and items that you can't buy always seem welcome. Additionally, it seems that things go in trends where there are a few regular items that are unavailable. Would you be able to ask him what those things are and send him some?

If he has certain shows that he likes to watch, but can't get via AFN, I bet he might like those.

OK, that's all for now.