Ups and downs

[elaby]

First of all, the awesome things:

Awesome thing number one is that I tentatively have a job! If everything goes through correctly, which the woman I spoke with was pretty sure it would, I'll be working as a writer for a financial company in the area. Within 20 minutes of home, no less. It's not a completely done deal yet, but I have a start date and I have to go in to do paperwork, so it's a pretty certain thing. Bwee!

Awesome thing number two is that I talked to anonymous_greg live on the phone today! I was kind of freaking out about our telephone and internet (am in the library at school, by the way, as caitirin be in class) being shut off in the middle of my phone interview today, so we had all the calls forward to my cell, which for some reason didn't ring in one instance. I was calling someone back whose call got cut off (I was worried it was the call I was waiting for) when I got another call - thinking it might be the interviewer, I answered. Instead, someone expressed surprise that the phone call worked and asked me if I were Caitirin! I recognized the voice, and OMG, it was anonymous_greg!! *jumps around* It made me just so happy and excited and totally no longer wigged out about the interview :) Which ended up being rescheduled to a few hours later anyway.

Now, onto the decidedly not-awesome thing and a question/plea:

I'd like to arrange a moment of silence for caitirin's external hard drive. We took it to Best Buy and they said that it was kaputz, something to do with the head (??). Data recovery, they told us, would be between $500 and $2200. GAH.

So if anyone out there knows anything about data recovery for less steep prices, we'd really appreciate hearing about it. Even $500 is way out of our range, and we're not sure how much it would cost anyway. There's a lot on there that Caitirin can get back from the internet, my computer, and other things, but there's also a ton she'd be losing (mostly older writing/schoolwork, pictures, and music). Help on this would really be appreciated. We're not even sure whether you can pick and choose what's recovered or whether they have to recover the whole thing in one go. If anybody knows what goes on in data recovery or of any places or people that do it for less, please let us know.

And that's it :)

Comments

[elaby.livejournal.com]

I'm sure she'd be really grateful if she has lost hers :)

And thanks! I remember fondly when we first met ^_^ We found your Christmas newsletter when we were moving and showed my mother C and his Halloween costume! So cute!

[materia-indigo.livejournal.com]

Congratulations on the new job!!!

As for data recovery ... do you guys have "Circuit City" out there? They did data recovery on one of our departmental laptops for under $200. Also call Geek Squad.

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Ooooh, thank you very much! For both the congrats and the advice. We do have Circuit City out here. I saw Geek Squad signs at Best Buy, and they were the ones that told us we'd have to send it out and pay a gazillion dollars for data recovery. Is Geek Squad a different entity or part of Best Buy?

[starandrea.livejournal.com]

Yay! Congratulations on the job! ♥

Marci had a work-related experience with data recovery last year: her dojo uses an external hard drive to store all of its important data, and she says at one point last year, "It made a funny noise, and the computer stopped registering its existence."

So she called Best Buy, and they said she could bring the hard drive to them and for a hundred dollars they would look at it and tell her whether they could save any of the data or not. She says, "I was like, '...I'll call you back.'"

She then called this other guy,* who has his own business in ::handwaving:: computer things. He said that there's almost no data that's irretrievable, it's just a question of how much you're willing to spend to get it back. Low cost data retrieval is possible, he says, if he can access it without having to open the case. (My sister adds, "That's like if it's only mostly broken.")

But, he says, if he has to crack the case open, "to get the platters," or something, that has to be done in a clean room and usually costs several thousand dollars. He said it could run her up to $4000. (That's if it's really broken, I assume.)

My sister adds, "He was really reasonable about the whole thing. He told me all of this over the phone before he did anything. He came and got it for free, he checked it for free--to see if it was mostly broken or really broken--and he offered to bring it back." He told her before he looked at it that if he *could* fix it, it would be about eighty dollars.

Unfortunately, when he looked at it, he said it was really broken. He offered to send it to a clean room, but Marci's sensei said no, too expensive, so they just bought a new hard drive from this guy. The *only* thing he charged them for in the whole process was the hard drive, which Marci says was reasonably priced.

In conclusion, Marci adds, "Tell them to definitely check around, because my experience with Best Buy was not good at all. But this guy was really helpful."

*The name of the guy Marci says was really helpful:

Will Lenharth
Lenharth Systems, LLC
Barrington, NH
(603) 664-7449
will@lenharthsystems.com

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Thank you so so so much! And the same magnitude of thank you to Marci too! *hugs* You guys are the best :)

And thanks also for the congrats! A whole lot of gratitude all around ^_^

[minyan.livejournal.com]

Yay for the job!

And may the computer get resurrected soon (or reincarnated to something with an equally capacious memory... an elephant would be helpful in moving... but I don't suppose it would play music...)

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Thanks :) I hope so too! An elephant would be quite convenient!

[templarwolf.livejournal.com]

Yeah, my parents had to spend a few thousand to get the stuff of their old HD. One of those being the thing Dad was writing for the War College...which was due the day after the computer got fried.

'Grats on the job.

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Aie yai yai, that sounds awful O.O

Thanks :)

[kniblet.livejournal.com]

Congrats on the new job.

No clue on data recovery. I'm hanging onto an old laptop just in case I ever figure out how to get stuff off it. It's been almost two years and I haven't missed the stuff on it yet.

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[coastal-spirit.livejournal.com]

I didn't read this entry first, so now know that you were posting from the library. :P

Of course I'm SO glad about the job and the new apartment. *huggles squees*

On the other hand, SO sorry about the hard drive. Yeesh. I can see that you're getting some good advice from others, so I don't have much to add. If those options don't work out, you might want to call Charlie Marshall and see what he has to say about it. He's always been very helpful, his prices are reasonable and if you tell him who you are and that you're my daughter, he might not charge you as much as usual, although I can't promise that.

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Ohhhh... cool! Good idea! I didn't even think of him! Thank you :)

[coastal-spirit.livejournal.com]

Oh, and much icon love. Majorly cool.

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Thanks ^_^ It's from a really neat bunch of manuscript-type icons semyaza makes.

[dave-t-lurker.livejournal.com]

Yay! For the job.

I suggested some stuff to Caitirin for the drive. Most of the cheap data recovery places can only really copy stuff off a working drive in a dead computer.

If it really is a head problem then the choices are limited :(

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Yikes. Thanks for letting Caitirin know, and thanks for the congrats :)

[hellbob.livejournal.com]

There is no hope other than the super-expensive route. That's why frequent backups are so important.

I assume you're hearing the "click of death". That means that one of the armatures has broken loose and is just flopping back and forth inside. It works a lot like a record player except there's several records stacked up spinning at 7200RPM rather than the 33/45RPM regular records do.

Basically, your needle broke and the only way to get the data off is to open it up and move the disks to another drive. Of course all of this has to be done in a sterile environment by people in the Intel bunny suits. Hence the cost.

Sorry for the bad news.

[hellbob.livejournal.com]

Oh, and hooray for the other stuff!

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Thanks :)

[jongleur-gerard.livejournal.com]

Grats on the job. Sorry about the HDD. I dont really ahve any connections atm. The only tech guy I know works on old comps at a gradeschool. He doesn't have access to a clean room.. If only there was some way to piggyback onto someone else's use of one.. gl with all.

[elaby.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the congrats and the advice :)