Data loss

[jim panse]

Well ... unfortunately I have very, very bad news. Today my data HD died on me without any warning.

I was "hoping" (and it looked like the fact) that is was my system drive that would die ... and I do not know if I will be able to recover too much.

If there is anyone who has experience with recovering HD drives, feel free to leave a post or two here, otherwise I fear *all* my Civ2 stuff is lost

More later, I got to leave for class now ...

[Sarsstock]

Oh god Steph thats awfull!! I can relate as it happened to me once while in school taking an entire semester's worth of non-backed up work with it. You have my sympathies .

Sadly I no nothing about data recovery, but just say the word and I'll post every unit and city graphic I have in my arsenal to help in the rebuilding process.

[Tigey]

The EXACT same thing happened to me on Friday. My PC restarted, then wouldn't boot at all. I think my C: drive died and wasn't recognisable. I'm afraid recovering your data is going to be difficult. I had someone come over literally not more than two hours ago and repair mine, but I've lost EVERYTHING in the process... For me, it was the other way round, I lost the system drive, but the data one was intact. Unfortunately, that too had to be formatted to reinstall XP...


Well, I lost almost everything. Do you have a USB stick, or other high capacity portable storage device (MP3 player, etc)? If you do, do not try to repair your PC yet! Formatting it, or reinstalling windows will lead to the contents being wiped! Try everything you can to get in, try playing around with the boot order in BIOS and through the "F8" option. If you can get in, immediately copy all that you can onto the memory device. I was able to somehow get in twice, and managed to recover some 7-8GBs of vital stuff, includintg the ONLY recent draft of my dissertation and of course, my Civ2 files.

If you can't get in to windows at all (and really, do keep trying, 20-30 times if you have to...), then the only way to see if you can recover the contents is probably to call someone in, and if it's outside its warranty, that will cost... (cost me £50 for 2 hours and a copy of XP)

[jim panse]

Hmmmm, funny enough when I returned from university just 10 mins ago my data drive appeared to be recogniseable & accessable again ... wtf?

I might want to buy a new PC despite this strange thing (mine being older than 4 and a half years now).

...

[Boco]

Reprieve!

Back up every bit of work that you don't want to lose!

[rjmatsleepers]

Re: Reprieve!

Originally posted by Boco
Back up every bit of work that you don't want to lose!

And straight away!

I had a similar warning, but it was Christmas day. I waited before acting. On Boxing day the whole system was belly up.

RJM at Sleeper's

[jim panse]

Well ... the current status is that I bought a new HD (unfortunately my old PC does not support more than two HDs ...) and I am copying my files like a madman to a safe location.

As far as I could tell it looks like I will be able to hang on to most data.

*phew*

Weird enough, first, in the "normal" mode Windows did not find my data HD, but now I am using the safe mode to back things up - and this seems to work.

*phew*

[Ecthy]

Well what can I say - a friend told me years ago my HD would die soon telling by the sounds it makes. It's still up and well

[curtsibling]

Backing up all data on a regular basis is the lesson here...

As always!

[Addled Platypus]

I paid some professionals

it was worth every penny



hope all goes well

[jim panse]

At the moment my computer is running in the safe mode, nothing else is working - but I was able to save my *important* (= Civ2) data

As it looks at the moment, I am going to be able to save my mp3 files too

[Ecthy]

I have gigabytes of Civ2 data. Scenarios, modpacks, savegames...

[CapTVK]

That was a close call with two important lessons: 1)always make backups and 2) make multiple backups (I have an USB HD for doing big backups and burn CDR´s for my particular stuff) you never know when it might happen.

[curtsibling]

Originally posted by Ecthy
I have gigabytes of Civ2 data. Scenarios, modpacks, savegames...

Best get yourself a 4.7 gig DVD and back that lot up!

[Ecthy]

Hmmm.... I might actually do that... if I had the money