Did I kill my hdd?

[je1983]

My main drive finally gave up on my last month. I was able to replace it and get on with my computing without issue, however I did try to attempt to access it via external sata-usb several times without success.


Early in this process I could not even access the drive so i gave it a quick knock or lifted it slightly and allowed it to drop on the table. This seemed to loosen things up to allow me access to the folders.The first few times I was able to start it up and open up the folder, see the files but not actually be able to access or transfer files because the drive would eventually cause thepc to hang or eventually disappear. I tried this maybe a dozen times, sometimes I would be able to get further into the files but whenever I tried to open something it would freeze and disappear.
Seeing as how the bumping and knocking the hdd moved things along earlier, i tried it again, a bit harder. Now the drive just spins up and powers down. I haven't been able to successfully get into it like I have before.


Did I kill my hdd or was there ever any chance of me accessing my old data?



EDIT: I had one important document which I was able to rewrite, the rest of the files I'm trying to access are music and movie files so it's not that important. I'm just curious if there is still anything I can do to access the drive.

 

[basroil]

knocking around an HDD was a very stupid idea. If it had already died before, probably just helped it stay that way, but definitely not something you ever want to do.

At this point, if that data is important enough you are willing to pay possibly hundreds or thousands of dollars for, take it to a professional. If not, just give up on it if it doesn't work on an internal or external connection

 

[SuperSoph_WD]

Hey there, @je1983!

Unfortunately, I don't think there's anything you can do about this HDD anymore. @Basroil is right, knocking it around was a very, very bad idea. Mechanical hard drives are very sensitive and they tend to damage easily even from the most insignificant fall. You might turn to a professional data recovery company for help, but finding one important document would definitely be costly. Data is stored in a very orderly pattern on each platter of the hard drive. Bits of data are arranged in circular paths called tracks and each track is broken up into smaller areas called sectors. Finding all the sectors containing that document (if they are not corrupted yet) would be pretty difficult.

Best of luck, though. Hope we were helpful.
SuperSoph_WD