Click of death

[draggar]

Any way of getting data off a HDD that's experienced the CLICK OF DEATH?

[lordlundar]

If the drive still runs, you might be able to get the non recoverable files if you're fast, but a total backup is not advisable.

If the drive is totally dead, your only hope is to go to a data recovery company, which charges a LOT of money and still can't guarantee a perfect recovery.

[draggar]

Freezer worked, hopfully I can get her data off it. So far, PST files are a success.

I'm wondering, is it possible to do this while at the PC (or "at" it though a remote desktop?) or is it always a hardware failure?

[Chromatix]

The "click of death" actually referred to Zip drives, which would actually destroy the formatting on the disk when they went wrong in that particular way.

There are four main failure modes for hard drives:

- Surface error - this kills a single sector or a smallish group of them. This is so common that the drive often recovers from this on it's own, but sometimes it will make a clicking sound while it attempts to read the faulty section. And sometimes it can't read it at all, but only that bit is lost. Standard recovery tools will work on this - and usually just an FFR is required to make the drive useful again.

- Broken head(s). This essentially wipes out a large section of the disk at once, because a misaligned or broken head cannot read anything on an entire side of a platter. It might also be scraping against the surface of one or more platters, damaging them in the process. If you catch it early, a professional disk recovery service will be your best option. Obviously, this is usually caused by physical abuse of the drive. One common symptom is a scraping sound - if this happens, power it down *immediately*.

- Spindle failure. This is where (usually) everything else works, but the main spindle motor has seized or simply blown. In a lesser form, this is the "stiction" suffered by old Quantum SCSI drives, which will start up as soon as you give them a good whack. Data recovery services will be able to handle these.

- Electronics failure. Some types of drive have a habit of burning out their interface board rather than the drive itself. This usually manifests by the drive not being recognised by the computer, even though it might still spin up. Usually the data can be recovered by temporarily fitting an identical board in place, but this is best left to a professional.

[draggar]

AH, that's where the click of death came from.

POST would see the HDD but the PC would not boot from it (no boot device). I had to slave the drive (SATA -> USB) to get the PC to see it (it had to be plugged in for at least 10 minutes for the PC to see it).

It was maiking loud noises (a lot of loud clicking) during that time. Data transfers are going very slowly now, though but the drive is relatively quiet now, too.

Basically, I'm wondering now if the drive could have been sabotaged remotely? The user said someone did remote in and lock them out, then "did a few things" and then she got the BSOD and the PC wouldn't boot up again.

[SteeleDragon78]

the remote sabotage is very unlikely, in order to cause hardware failure like you are describing you would need to physically damage the drive. in my experience there is very little one could do to the drive to cause hardware failure, and nothing to that extent. (killing drivers or creating multiple ghost copies of hardware etc) the fact that the freezer trick worked is a pretty good indicator that its a physical issue.

[LostMyMind]

I'm going to guess that the "clicking" is from head "parking" mechanism from a minor electronics failure. Strangely enough, I've had this type of failure myself. Just get everything you want off and toss the paperweight away.

As for remote sabotage, it would have to be pretty specific attack to kill hardware. Replacing/deleting firmware, bios, etc.... which would seem to be counter productive for a remote takeover.