LaCie harddrives

[Luvian]

Originally posted by Bozos of Bones: A format, then reraise windows and then reformat with different partitions will get rid of any and all data on a disk. BTW, it's still possible, although somewhat hard, to get the data back at this point, unless you're actively using the drive. Me and my friend managed to retrieve 8 years old information from a 510 MB drive in about a half an hour of work. All it takes is time, take it to someone who you know can do stuff with PCs and ask him if he's able to retrieve data.

There are probably programs to do that now.

[Yorick]

Originally posted by Bozos of Bones: A format, then reraise windows and then reformat with different partitions will get rid of any and all data on a disk. BTW, it's still possible, although somewhat hard, to get the data back at this point, unless you're actively using the drive. Me and my friend managed to retrieve 8 years old information from a 510 MB drive in about a half an hour of work. All it takes is time, take it to someone who you know can do stuff with PCs and ask him if he's able to retrieve data.

It's a 160gb drive. I just backed up my 40gb computers internal drive onto it, figuring I didn't want to lose what's on there now.

It's a mac, not a pc. Who would I send it to though? I thought formatting was the end of the line? Will it matter that I've put 40gb worth of stuff on it now?

I can't bring myself to use the drive for music now. I backed up my computers drive only because I only have one old backup of that on another tekserve drive.

I have eight drives in all. THREE failed in the space of three weeks. The two LaCies, and an acomdata drive that had been showing problems for a while. I managed to get most of the stuff on that onto other drives. Unfortunately much went onto the LaCies that failed also.

I had heard mised reports about the LaCies before. Some said they were good. Others reported problems. At this stage, I'd only reccomend the TEKSERVE hard drives for macs. None of them have broken down.

I still can't believe it. I've lost work. It's affected my confidence to compose and create new stuff. To place any value on what I record. Really upsetting.

Thanksfully I did get my two CDs finished and mastered and manufactured before all this. Any remixes of the electronica stuff are impossible now though. I'm stuck with whatever's on the CD.

[philip]

Don't use the drives now. Even after some a format (or more) you can get stuff back. Though the data recovery isn't free the information on it is (except maybe for phone costs) and you might get them back later if you want to or it's still of use to you.

Really sorry to hear those stupids just formatted your HD and say they aren't responsible for data loss.

[Hivetyrant]

Originally posted by Felix The Assassin: Yorick, did you check the serial number to ensure that is your drive. Could be possibly it got switched? [/QB]

This is a good point, you should try and check this out, just in case.

[Yorick]

Ok. I won't use the drive. I won't erase the new 40gb backup data, I'll just put it aside for now. Again, will it matter that new info is on it? 40gb out of 160gb? I won't touch it further.

I did check the serial, and it is my drive.

[Luvian]

Originally posted by Yorick: Ok. I won't use the drive. I won't erase the new 40gb backup data, I'll just put it aside for now. Again, will it matter that new info is on it? 40gb out of 160gb? I won't touch it further. I did check the serial, and it is my drive.

Well... you have overwriten 40 gigs of data, but you should be able to get the rest.

I'm no expert, but from what I think I usderstood, when you format or delete a file, the computer don't really remove it. He just flag it as useless data that can be overwriten. Probably something like a 1 or 0 data that say if it can be overwriten or not. So when you delete of format, it just add a 1 instead of a 0, and when people restore them, they replace the 1 by a 0 again, and the data is available again.

I might be wrong, but I think it's something like that.

I also heard that when the government want to investigate a hard drive for some reason, even if the drive has been broken, they can use a device to look at the drive physically and recover the data. I think they said that in the same arcticle I read.

[Animal]

A low level format will take care of any data you don't want seen. It writes 0's and 1's to the entire drive prior to an actual format. IIRC, on a 40GB it would take about 6hours to complete.

[Luvian]

Originally posted by Animal: A low level format will take care of any data you don't want seen. It writes 0's and 1's to the entire drive prior to an actual format. IIRC, on a 40GB it would take about 6hours to complete.

How do you do that?

[Animal]

Originally posted by Luvian: quote: Originally posted by Animal: A low level format will take care of any data you don't want seen. It writes 0's and 1's to the entire drive prior to an actual format. IIRC, on a 40GB it would take about 6hours to complete.

How do you do that? [/QUOTE]You'll need a specific app, or the floppy that comes with most HD's. It can't be done from within Windows, you have to boot from DOS first. Back in the day of 500MB HD's it was common practice, but with drive's reaching over 200GB it can take over 24 hours to complete a full low level format.

It's also useful for getting a little extra life out of a drive that has developed bad sectors.

[Timber Loftis]

Yorick, Aerich's advice was about what mine would be. Maliciousness is only required here were politicians and celebrities are concerned, or sometimes where a public concern is at issue (your situation is pretty attenuated regarding a public concern -- it's an industry concern at best). Rather than malice, the intent requirement in most instances is that you be intentional or grossly negligent in making your false statement.

Anyway, if it's true, it's an absolute defense. Of course, guess who has to prove it's true? So long as you can back up what you say, you're okay.

But, those blanket statements identified by Aerich -- well, retract them if you can.