External backup hard drive non-op

[Exprezchef]

My external hard drive I use for backups and keeping important files has suddenly stopped working (sort of). My desktop recognizes the hard drive is connected and I can hear and feel it running, but for some reason it won't let me access the files when I attempt to open it. Everything freezes, including the desktop. I am really upset because I have been using it to store my FI spreadsheet that includes over 5 years of financial data. Any computer geeks out there have any ideas of how to get it up and running to access the data? I plugged it into another computer to see if it was an issue with my desktop and I get the same results.  I am hoping to get it back up and running without using a data recovery service to do so.
It is an older Seagate Free Agent Desk 500gb.

[anon-e-mouse]

I'm assuming you are using a PC and not a Mac?

[Exprezchef]

Affirm on the use of a PC. Something I forgot to mention in the original post. The hard drive was operating fine until Monday. It is set to do its weekly backup overnight on Sundays so I am assuming something happened while it was performing the backup that corrupted it. Unfortunately I cannot access it to perform a restore. 

[3okirb]

Affirm on the use of a PC. Something I forgot to mention in the original post. The hard drive was operating fine until Monday. It is set to do its weekly backup overnight on Sundays so I am assuming something happened while it was performing the backup that corrupted it. Unfortunately I cannot access it to perform a restore.

Being a backup drive, that means you have all the original stuff on your computer?  If so, I'd find a way to back it up somewhere else until you figure this out.  I think OneDrive has a 100gb promotion going on right now that you could use if you don't want to invest in a new hard drive right away.

[anon-e-mouse]

My spider senses tell me that he kept the originals on the external drive.

Exprezchef - a 'quick fix' would be to ask a person with a linux or Mac laptop to give it a quick try.
Since it appears to be spinning, there's a chance that a computer using a different operating system can see the files.
If you have nerd skills, you can create a Boot CD (or USB) with Knoppix.  That'll boot your computer up temporarily with Linux.

If not... then there's a much lower chance that data recovery tools would help.

Have you checked for virus, malware, and such?  They can cause all sorts of issues.

[deborah]

I take it everything freezes when you access it at all (for instance to see its properties). Does it freeze while it is being connected?

If that is the case, it sounds dud. In my experience, the most likely time for a disk to fail is during a backup, because you are exercising it more than at any other time - and let us say that I probably have more experience with dud disks than others.

You could have bad sectors that need remapping, and if your computer can actually connect it, you could remap the bad sectors using one of the utilities (it's been quite a while since I've done this but there is plenty on the internet about it - google is your friend). However, if it is as bad as it sounds, you probably need to move everything to a new drive - if you can - before you can't access it at all.

Why does it sound bad? Because these days bad sectors are automatically remapped to spare sectors, so you have either got a lot of bad sectors, or the automatic remapping isn't working. A disk with that many bad sectors may have something wrong that is causing bad sectors (a disk head has fallen off and started scratching the disk for instance), and this will only get worse the more it spins.

Of course, having spent more sleepless nights than I like to recall trying to recover dud disks, I tend to have a fairly worst case view of disks, and things could be a lot better.

[Exprezchef]

I was able to hook up the drive to a friends' iMac and am able see most of the files that were there ie; photos, videos and some music files. Unfortunately my all important financial stuff does not show up, but other older .xls files are there. I moved them to a thumb drive and they open up fine on my PC. I find it strange that my financial stuff is primarily what is missing, however this was the last thing that was accessed before the backup. Since I am able to open up the drive on an iMac are there any other recommendations I should try before I just write it off??  Would I be wasting my time and money in having it checked by a data recovery service?

[anon-e-mouse]

I suspect that your financial files may have been open when the external drive corrupted/failed.  Normally, the operating system creates a file that starts with ~ (tilde) when the file is open.  Either way, the file 'should' exist even if unusable.  I would ask your friend to make sure that hidden files would be visible. 
In my experience, once you start having issues like this, I no longer trust the drive.  You can try reformatting, but I'd call it a loss.

[deborah]

Well, it sounds better than expected, and you have got things off. It doesn't sound like a disk problem - rather a file corruption problem - probably the files were open during the backup and excel was trying to write at the same time as the backup program to the same part of the disk (excel does write even when it is not being used - one reason why you are not supposed to have anything open during computer updates).

Am I correct in that it only freezes up when you access the files with excel? Or does it freeze up at other times?

[Exprezchef]

Well, it sounds better than expected, and you have got things off. It doesn't sound like a disk problem - rather a file corruption problem - probably the files were open during the backup and excel was trying to write at the same time as the backup program to the same part of the disk (excel does write even when it is not being used - one reason why you are not supposed to have anything open during computer updates).

Am I correct in that it only freezes up when you access the files with excel? Or does it freeze up at other times?

I am also thinking it is a corrupted file problem. When I plug it into my desktop, or any other PC, it is recognized as an external drive. It had originally been named "HP Backup", but now it only shows up as an "H" drive. When plugged into an iMAC, it recognizes it as the originally named drive. When I click on it, it starts to read the drive very slowly and slows down even more as it comes to the end. It then freezes up and does nothing else. I have a computer tech nerd friend who stated he may have software that can access the drive and repair the corrupted files; at least enough to move the data to a good drive and hopefully recover the missing data. Thanks to all for your help and advice.

[MidWestLove]

"I am also thinking it is a corrupted file problem"

+1. you probably need to run chkdsk/fsck to see first what condition the file system is in and then decide if you want to repair it. at that point, the system will fix what it can fix and you can look at the extent of the issue.  once data is off (and copied elsewhere), you can run the actual hard drive validations using whatever the vendor provides and decide if you want to keep/discard it. with hard drive prices for external HDD  <$50 per TB enclosure included, my read on it would be if you have any doubts about hardware - throw it out

[GizmoTX]

It's much safer to use two external drives & rotate them, with the oldest a week old. If you keep original content on an external, you need a backup for it.

With computer hardware, a crash is a matter of when, not if.

[3okirb]

Also, make sure you destroy the old drive completely when you decide to move on so nothing is recoverable by someone else.  Especially since you had financial information on it.

[k-vette]

You may want to try a smart status check on the drive.  (Lookup smartmontools)  if a high number of reallocated sectors or ata erros are shown the drive is dying.  Try a sector by sector copy of the drive connected directly to a pc using the sata connections.  (To improve speed of the transfer)  this means youll have to remove it from the case.

If no errors are shown the drive may still be good after a clean and reformat.

[jmusic]

You may want to try a smart status check on the drive.  (Lookup smartmontools)  if a high number of reallocated sectors or ata erros are shown the drive is dying.  Try a sector by sector copy of the drive connected directly to a pc using the sata connections.  (To improve speed of the transfer)  this means youll have to remove it from the case.

If no errors are shown the drive may still be good after a clean and reformat.

+1. 

Though I highly doubt that the drive is still good based on the symptoms.  DO NOT TRUST THIS DRIVE.

[Kaspian]

When you've exhausted absolutely every other avenue trying to get content off of it and get to the point you're going to throw it out, put it in a Ziploc bag, place it in the freezer for a few hours, then try it again.  Sometimes it works--contracts some of the metal parts inside or something and temporarily realigns the drive head?  ...Now I'm bullshitting, I don't know why this works at all, but I have been able to retrieve files several times like this off a dead drive. 

[Exprezchef]

When you've exhausted absolutely every other avenue trying to get content off of it and get to the point you're going to throw it out, put it in a Ziploc bag, place it in the freezer for a few hours, then try it again.  Sometimes it works--contracts some of the metal parts inside or something and temporarily realigns the drive head?  ...Now I'm bullshitting, I don't know why this works at all, but I have been able to retrieve files several times like this off a dead drive.

LOL..I read about that same solution on another site and had to laugh.  I guess if it works though, I'll have to try as I've got nothing to lose. I still feel it is a software issue vs. hardware issue and later this week I am getting together with a computer nerd friend who thinks he may be able to retrieve the lost data. Wish me luck.

As a side note, I remembered I had actually printed out the data I lost at the beginning of February when I met with a financial advisor friend of mine to go over my FIRE plan. He still had the copies I gave him so it looks like most of the data may not be lost at all. If I am not able to retrieve my spreadsheet, I still have most of the data to use to create a new database. The formulas are what take me the longest to create.   

[Sibley]

Your working copy should be on the most secure drive - which is the internal hard drive. Don't run things off external drives or flash drives. They're great for transport and backup, but less robust for actually working off them. If you accidentally bump the external it can cause all sorts of problems, from corruption to damage of the device. No, being really careful when you move it doesn't make it ok (my friend's argument, she's heading for a catastrophic external hard drive failure and won't listen to the 6 tech-ey people who tell her not to do what she's doing).

You should also monitor hard drives periodically for signs of problems. Run check disk every couple months. If you start seeing problems, it might be time to replace the hard drive.

[Exprezchef]

A techy friend of mine looked the hard drive today and was sad to report that most of the data has been lost. It appears that what we suspected was the case with the unit. The hardware seems to be OK but for some reason some of the files became corrupted and were unrecoverable. He suspects it had something to do with the weekly back-up running the same time a software update was running. The drive is pretty old so I am going to scrap it any buy a newer larger capacity drive. I am already starting to create a new and improved spreadsheet and will make sure I keep the original working copy on the main computer and use the external for back-ups only. I also plan on printing out hard copies each month so in the event both die, I still have data.

Thanks to all for your recommendations.

[miss daisy]

My backup drive is currently dying and I'm trying to remember why I stopped using Mozy.  Do you not use online backup for a particular reason?

[Sibley]

Personally, I don't feel the need for an online backup. I don't have business records, so the backups I do periodically work for me. IE - if my hard drive crashed, I'd live.

You have to pay for many online backup sites, which can be more expensive than buying your own hard drive. Also, there can be concerns about data security and access.

[sleepyguy]

could be the controller board is defective.  remove the drive out of the external casing and attach it directly to an internal SATA (hopefully it isn't that old with PATA interface) ports.

freezer trick works "sometimes"... putting the drive in the freezer for 20mins then powering it up.

give it a go... you only need it powered on long enough to retrieve the data.