Long post/question...

Ok, so I have the 500 GB My Book, A Compaq Presario C700 running Windows Vista Home Premium...

The external drive has worked great since I bought it, till now. Now when I go to My Computer to get into it, there is a pop up window that says I need to format it to access it...

Obviously I don't want to do that, I have several thousand photos, documents, music, etc. On the drive. So I hit cancel...

I've done some file recovery in the past and have "Recover My Files" software on the computer. Thing is when I run it on the external it takes so long that the computer shuts down from, I assume, overheating. The longest the computer ran for was 6 days elevated for more air flow, no joy. Might have gotten through 1% of the external in that time...


My real question is this, would a good desktop system (say, the HP H8-1040) get through the drive in a decent amount of time? Or would it simply overheat as well?

I've been saving for that particular desktop just because I need one, not specifically for this purpose...

Also, what do you guys think of that particular system? Give me the good, the bad, or recommendations please!

I can't offer any comments on your computer choice, but I do have some advice on the external drive. Please see:
link 1
link 2

I will say that SpinRite will work better/faster if the drive is internally installed, although that is not feasible with a laptop.

Best of luck,
WallyH

Thanks for the advice, however the recovery software I have is capable of finding the files. The problem is that it takes too long. After 6 days the software was able to find about 1% of what was on the drive, or 1% of the drive itself...

Like I was really asking, would a more powerful computer, like the one I listed, speed up the search and recovery of the 500 GB drive?

On another note, if I get a desktop with an extra hard drive bay, can I remove the drive from the enclosure and put it in the tower? That would be faster right?

Is it those MyBook drives? I don't hagve anything good to say about those. I helped several of my clients with these, the little circuit boards on them burn out. I dismantle them and slave them to my PC to save their data. Good luck.

I'd say that any computer capable of running Vista should be fast enough to do what you want. However, if the disk itself is sick, the operating system may have to keep reading and re-reading each sector on the drive in order to get a clean read. The Spinrite program has some advanced techniques (which still take a lot of time) to get the data from a bad sector and move it to a good sector.

Based on what NeedKarma says, your best bet may be to relocate the drive to a computer and deal with it there. If the controller circuitry is bad, getting good data off the drive will be difficult, if not impossible.

Bottom line, I think your computer is not the issue here.

Hope this helps,
WallyH

Ok firstly id say pop the enclosure and get it into a tower see if its even needed to keep searching for corrupted files as the controlling board in the enclosure could be bad/causing your issue. Secondly until you do that DO NOT RUN THE HD! If it is failing the more you run it the more damage will be done. Wait till you can test your BEST option, then go from their.

Option 2: get a ERD, I recommend using ERD to recover files over any other program I know of for several reasons. It boots you into a safe/minimal environment meaning more memory/clock cycles available than while in windows, and secondly the latest ERD disks are made BY windows, which means frankly they are better. (I won't get all into why or this post will be a mile long). Add to that that erd disks can be obtained for free(minus your cost for the burnable media). Anyway using their file/disk recovery is your best bet at getting your data back. If its still failing to retrieve your data at this point your probably screwed. But you have one final option.(unless you're a multimillionaire).

Go buy another HD and use a ghost program to make a(or attempt to make) a copy of all your data off the bad hard drive onto your new one. But frankly if the first 2 don't work your chances are low on this option.

Final option... if you have a spare 10+grand and the data is that important there are a few companies out their that offer data recovery that have an insanely expensive process that can recover your data. If it comes to that and you have the spare cash I guess lmk I can give you a list of the companies that offer the service. But anything before that that those companies do (which generally starts at hundreds if not thousands of dollars) can be done by you for free or cheap as listed above.

@Darkvision... I do now plan on your first recommendation, though the third also sounds interesting... How would you recommend copying to another drive? Would that be while inside a tower? Or while still in the enclosure?

As to the tower solution... It's going to take me time to get it done... I was planning on just buying a desktop, but then I decided to build one... So it will be quite a while... Thanks for the ideas and for any further comments...

Funny how my response was deemed unhelpful and that's the one the OP is now going for.

For the third option you would need both your damaged+new hard drive in the same enclosure, a device is made that can do this without having it in a PC but it costs a bit(last I saw one it was around 150$ with no hard drive, so just using your tower is best) as to what ghosting is it creates a exact copy of a drive to another drive, the link below is to 5 free programs that will do that for you.

5 Free Apps to Clone Your Hard Drive

I marked it unhelpful because you didn't provide any information that I hadn't given or asked about previously... Look right above your post and you will see where I asked about pulling the drive from the enclosure and installing in a desktop tower... I had the idea in mind before ever asking for opinions but just wanted to see what others think before I do anything of the sort...

As to the other part, I had said that the drive is a My Book external on the first line of the original post. 8th and 9th words...

Thanks for trying to make me look dumb... :)

Well I think I may have nailed why the drive failed or is failing. Keeping it in its own enclosure and running their embedded software is what is tipping you from recovering any data.
And my recommended course of action is what you are now going for. No one tried to make you look dumb.

Okay, I'm just updating here. I have looked through everything and am still unable to test any theories as I don't yet have a desktop to install the drive into.

When I do have a desktop and can test some of these answers I'll update again and let you guys know what my out come is.

As to my use of the helpful/unhelpful buttons. I've contacted an admin or mod to help me understand the ways that you guys use them. I used the buttons based on what I felt was helpful and am sorry if I offended NeedKarma with that action.

Thanks everyone for your suggestions. :)

If you don't have a desktop to slave the drive into you might to spend a few $ to get a SATA external enclosure that connects with a USB cable to any computer. Make sure it's SATA first of course :).

Thanks for the new suggestion. I had considered that option, but I decided a few weeks ago to fulfill an old dream of building a computer.

I asked around on a couple sites and put together a list of what would serve me best in a desktop. I'm currently saving to buy everything and am going to have my cousin help me build it. (He works at a computer shop and builds all the time. And yes I did ask for his opinion on this threads question... )

Again, thanks for the suggestion and, again, sorry for the earlier dispute...