hello,
i have a Lacie 500GB external harddrive that's been sweet and i've
stored a lot of stuff on there. Essentially what's happened is that
it's stopped working and the usual sort of spinning sound of the disk
in the hard drive has stopped and now makes a repetitive tzz tzz tzz
sound that's relatively quiet. What i assume is that the data is all
there and recoverable and that it's just some other mechanisms that
have screwed up. What can I do?

Jahan Penny-Dimri wrote:
hello,
i have a Lacie 500GB external harddrive that's been sweet and i've
stored a lot of stuff on there. Essentially what's happened is that
it's stopped working and the usual sort of spinning sound of the disk
in the hard drive has stopped and now makes a repetitive tzz tzz tzz
sound that's relatively quiet. What i assume is that the data is all
there and recoverable and that it's just some other mechanisms that
have screwed up. What can I do?



It might be possible to replace the motor driver chip, or swap the
circuit board over from an identical drive. I've fixed a drive once by
replacing a mosfet driving the motor but that was an old drive with
discrete parts while most today use one big IC to do that stuff.

This is precisely why backups are so important.

You will need exactly the same drive board from exactly the same size, type,
speed of drive you're trying to recover the data from.
If the data is valuable to you the consideration of commercial data
retrieval may be recommended.
"James Sweet" wrote in message
news:MRpNh.4296$fA2.3196@trndny02...
Jahan Penny-Dimri wrote:
hello,
i have a Lacie 500GB external harddrive that's been sweet and i've
stored a lot of stuff on there. Essentially what's happened is that
it's stopped working and the usual sort of spinning sound of the disk
in the hard drive has stopped and now makes a repetitive tzz tzz tzz
sound that's relatively quiet. What i assume is that the data is all
there and recoverable and that it's just some other mechanisms that
have screwed up. What can I do?



It might be possible to replace the motor driver chip, or swap the circuit
board over from an identical drive. I've fixed a drive once by replacing a
mosfet driving the motor but that was an old drive with discrete parts
while most today use one big IC to do that stuff.

This is precisely why backups are so important.

Art wrote:
You will need exactly the same drive board from exactly the same size, type,
speed of drive you're trying to recover the data from.
If the data is valuable to you the consideration of commercial data
retrieval may be recommended.
"James Sweet" wrote in message
news:MRpNh.4296$fA2.3196@trndny02...
Jahan Penny-Dimri wrote:
hello,
i have a Lacie 500GB external harddrive that's been sweet and i've
stored a lot of stuff on there. Essentially what's happened is that
it's stopped working and the usual sort of spinning sound of the disk
in the hard drive has stopped and now makes a repetitive tzz tzz tzz
sound that's relatively quiet. What i assume is that the data is all
there and recoverable and that it's just some other mechanisms that
have screwed up. What can I do?


It might be possible to replace the motor driver chip, or swap the circuit
board over from an identical drive. I've fixed a drive once by replacing a
mosfet driving the motor but that was an old drive with discrete parts
while most today use one big IC to do that stuff.

This is precisely why backups are so important.



All good suggestions if the logic is the cause of his disk motor not
working. His comment regarding the "Tzz, tzz, tzz" sounds a lot like it
might be the heads sticking to the platters. If this is the case, a
jarring of the drive into the palm of your hand while power is applied
might free up the heads. Older drives encountered this type of problem
frequently. It is true that newer ones encounter this less, but it
might still be the problem rather than bad logic.

Ken wrote:

Art wrote:

You will need exactly the same drive board from exactly the same size,
type, speed of drive you're trying to recover the data from.
If the data is valuable to you the consideration of commercial data
retrieval may be recommended.
"James Sweet" wrote in message
news:MRpNh.4296$fA2.3196@trndny02...

Jahan Penny-Dimri wrote:

hello,
i have a Lacie 500GB external harddrive that's been sweet and i've
stored a lot of stuff on there. Essentially what's happened is that
it's stopped working and the usual sort of spinning sound of the disk
in the hard drive has stopped and now makes a repetitive tzz tzz tzz
sound that's relatively quiet. What i assume is that the data is all
there and recoverable and that it's just some other mechanisms that
have screwed up. What can I do?


It might be possible to replace the motor driver chip, or swap the
circuit board over from an identical drive. I've fixed a drive once
by replacing a mosfet driving the motor but that was an old drive
with discrete parts while most today use one big IC to do that stuff.

This is precisely why backups are so important.




All good suggestions if the logic is the cause of his disk motor not
working. His comment regarding the "Tzz, tzz, tzz" sounds a lot like it
might be the heads sticking to the platters. If this is the case, a
jarring of the drive into the palm of your hand while power is applied
might free up the heads. Older drives encountered this type of problem
frequently. It is true that newer ones encounter this less, but it
might still be the problem rather than bad logic.
I remember a series of Samsung Drives, after about 1 mouth of operation,
you didn't want to turn them off! other wise, you would have to bump the
drive in side to get it to start up.
I got my hands on a bunch of these defective drives (new) and had them
put in servers, i found that if you kept them running for at least 4
months or so, they corrected them self's!
something to do with the bearings not machined correctly in the platter.


--
"I'm never wrong, once i thought i was, but was mistaken"
Real Programmers Do things like this.
http://webpages.charter.net/jamie_5

Hi!

What i assume is that the data is all
there and recoverable and that it's just some other mechanisms that
have screwed up. What can I do?

I think that's a good assumption. First, check your power supply to see that
it is working properly.

If the power supply checks out, the hard drive is probably suffering from
so-called "stiction" problems. Stiction happens when the drive's heads
somehow adhere themselves to the platters and the spindle motor isn't strong
enough to break the bond and start the drive. Gently shaking or rotating the
drive casing while turning it on may solve the problem. Setting the drive
casing in the sun or in a cool place (be very careful if you put it in the
freezer--condensate forming on the drive platters as it warms up may really
ruin things!) may also cause the heads to loosen up.

If the drive starts and runs, it may be fine. Still, it would be a very good
idea to have another drive handy for backup purposes. If there is a failure,
you may only get a few chances to read your data!

William

All good suggestions if the logic is the cause of his disk motor not
working. His comment regarding the "Tzz, tzz, tzz" sounds a lot like it
might be the heads sticking to the platters. If this is the case, a
jarring of the drive into the palm of your hand while power is applied
might free up the heads. Older drives encountered this type of problem
frequently. It is true that newer ones encounter this less, but it
might still be the problem rather than bad logic.


Nah, I haven't seen this in drives made in the last 15 years or so. It
took the old oxide coated platters to stick in any reasonable amount of
time.

James Sweet wrote:



All good suggestions if the logic is the cause of his disk motor
not working. His comment regarding the "Tzz, tzz, tzz" sounds a lot
like it might be the heads sticking to the platters. If this is the
case, a jarring of the drive into the palm of your hand while power is
applied might free up the heads. Older drives encountered this type
of problem frequently. It is true that newer ones encounter this
less, but it might still be the problem rather than bad logic.


Nah, I haven't seen this in drives made in the last 15 years or so. It
took the old oxide coated platters to stick in any reasonable amount of
time.
Could be, but it is worth the try.

Hi!

The OP didn't say. (LaCie makes the box, not the drives)
I used to most often see stiction on Seagates & Miniscribes.

Probably Seagate. I have 250 and 160 GB versions of these drives. Every one
so far has been a Seagate on the inside.

William