Calling ALL Computer Skilled Persons:I'm Train-sim-less
Started by NPBL24145 posts5 min read
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Hey there fellow train-sim'ers, I have been abscent from MSTS for almost 5 months now, due to a hard drive failure on my "new" presario.-new meaning over a year old-. In the mean time I have been conducting all of my business on this stone aged computer that I recieved way back, for the Christmas of 96!! I'm here on this forum in hopes of getting some advice on what to do about my hard drive in hopes of saving my presario Here's the scenario: My uncle who is pretty computer savy stated that on the actual physical hard drive there is some kind of round plate or something that "reads" info off the computer. He also stated that this "plate" is very sensitive and can be damaged by something simple i.e thick smoke or a bump to the computer. I have to agree with his theory about the bump because just a few days before my system started going down the tube me and my big clumsy feet kicked the computer off the stand, which sits no more than 4 inches off the carpet. Basically what I'm trying to do is try to get the "plate" replaced inside of the hard drive, and salvage some of the info on the hard drive. Can it be done? Thanks for any help or advice that one can give nl2428@yahoo.com ross2556@msn.com or you can just reply here
RE: Calling ALL Computer Skilled Persons:I'm Train-sim-
Before you do anything rash (read: expensive), try re-seating the connections for cables and cards (unplug and plug back in one at a time). If you're uncomfortable doing this (you have to be careful about static), then it would be very wise (and inexpensive) to get someone knowledgable to do this for you. You may be surprised to find that nothing's broke, and that something had worked its way loose.Best Buy, Comp USA, and most PC stores can do this for $20 or $30 (call and check). Good luck. Cheers! Marc - 3DTrains http://www.3dtrains.comPro Series Super Packs
RE: Calling ALL Computer Skilled Persons:I'm Train-sim-
You can't physically fix a drive once it crashes. This is what's known as a head crash. The way a hard disk works is a head rides above each platter (Without touching it. It only rides a few millimeters off the surface) reading and writing magnetically off an oxidized coating on the platter. This is where the information is stored. If the the head comes in contact it scratches the coating off the platter, resulting in the loss of data that was at that location. If it happens to be in the boot block sector or any files required to boot at least DOS, the system won't boot. You still may be able to recover some files though. If it is in the sector of the disk where the file index information is stored. You may not be able to read the disk yourself, however it may still be possible for a computer technician to recover files. This can be expensive though. Usually about $200.00. If you can't boot from the disk try booting with a bootable floppy. If you created an Emergency disk when windows was installed you can use that. If not see if you can create one on another computer. Boot in DOS. Try and access the drive by typeing the drive letter followed by a colon. EX: C:. If you can get this far, your file index sector is readable. CD to the directory you want to try and recover. Try and copy them to another drive preferably another installed HD drive. If the file is'nt damaged you should be able to recover it. If it's damaged you will probably get an error message indicating it. Keep doing this until you recovered (Or atleast tried to) All the files you need. Note: Only try to recover data files not programs. As programs would probably require subsequent files or registry changes which you won't be able to recover. This is alot of work, and no gaurantee it will work depending on your situation. I wouldn't try it unless you absolutely need files on the disk. If that is the case, your best bet is to take it a professional technician, as they have the best chance of recovering everything possibe. Else just reinstall a new disk and reinstall all your software.
RE: Calling ALL Computer Skilled Persons:I'm Train-sim-
If I were you I would buy a new hard drive and install your os on that. Then connect your old drive and see if you can access anything on it.--Victorian Railfan Web Site: http://www.railpage.org.au/vr/Victorian B's for MSTS! Now available!
RE: Calling ALL Computer Skilled Persons:I'm Train-sim-
Thanks all for the quick responses, please keep them coming as I'm open to all advice. Making sure everything is snug inside the computer was one of the first things that I did, but it proved unsuccessful When I turn the PC on I get a message on a black screen saying " Unable to locate any operating System on Any Hardrives" When I insert the Compaq recovery CD, the computer kind of loads up and starts going through a detection process where I get messages on a black screen stating loading windows 98 and starts displaying other computer specifications. Then a red screen pops up displaying that there is an error on my recovery cd. I'am able to access a form of dos but the only thing that I'm faimilar with in dos is how to look at files, I have no clue as to what I'm looking at. More than likley I'll just hand it to the proffesionals as it seems to be out of my hands now.
