HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!computer bofin needed

[northstandnorth]

Hi
I have just put an 18v supply into my 12v Seagate external H.D. apart from a lack of any wirring and nice green LED's I got a slight whiff of burning.
Can you offer any hope of recovering 25gig of Music(hope my Ipod dont die) and literally thousands of Photo's(thankfully mostly backed up to DVD).

 

[gullshark]

how on earth did you manage that? I would say you've very likely cooked it.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Have you tried switching it off and on again?

 

[Husty]

why would you knowingly do that?

 

[northstandnorth]

I lent it to someone,they had a couple of DVD's of photos but no DVD player on their laptop,I loaded the DVD's on it so they could print some pictures,it came back with their laptop lead.
yes I have turned it off and on again.

 

[1066familyman]

I thought I'd cooked our netgear wireless router once by doing a similiar thing. Smoke was coming out of it and there was that horrible smell to go with it. I unplugged it sharpish and didn't go near it again until I'd bought a replacement adapter that I could set to the right power rating. Thankfully it worked fine and is still going strong now - about a year on from said incident.

Hopefully you've got away with it.

Good luck.

 

[haardman]

Most external hard drives are just a standard 3.5" internal hard drive attached to a small biit of circuit board which acts as a USB to SATA/IDE converter.
You have most likely fried the circuitboard, not the hard disk.

Open up the unit, extract the hard disk and then buy the relevant caddy for it (depending upon the interface to the hard disk)
e.g:
a) SATA - Extra Value 3.5 USB2.0 Hard Drive Enclosure for upto 1.5TB SATA Hard Drives - Retail - Ebuyer
b) IDE - Sumvision 3.5 IDE USB2.0 Black Aluminium Caddy - Retail - Ebuyer

(Unless you have one of the portable 2.5" laptop drives - in which case the same applies you just need the 2.5" version of the above).

Good luck

 

[Billy the Fish]

Deffo try it with the correct power before you take it apart, I've heard things go pop and smell of burning but still work, it could just be a capacitor gone. If not, you'll have to take it apart as per above.

 

[northstandnorth]

thanks for the advice folks.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

Follow Haardmans advise first but if that fails then there are plenty of data recovery companies that could get it back for you - just google "hard drive data recovery". most charge around £100 with money back if they can't get it back.

You've probably just blown an internal fuse or circuit board so you should be OK.

 

[Shropshire Seagull]

Is it still under warrenty?

If yes, you could try a blag of "it just stoped working guv".
They should then offer a repair or replacement.
Your could press for a repair given you want the data recovered but remenber that once you've accepted repair you forgo you rights to a replacement.

If not under warrenty:
If it is a SATA or IDE std unit inside, I'd hook that up to a PC and see if the data is visible.
Only then would I try powering up again.

Good luck

 

[northstandnorth]

yo folks.
Finally got it back from a man who had problems getting it apart(really weird Torx type screws but I found a way)
My drive is an ULTRA ATA but being thick(and handy at making screwdrivers fit weird screws) can anyone please explain the difference (if any)between ULTRA ATA and SATA and suggest a suitable reasonably priced enclosure.
Cheers NSC

 

[public school boy]

You didn't want to do that did you?

 

[Cian]

yo folks.
Finally got it back from a man who had problems getting it apart(really weird Torx type screws but I found a way)
My drive is an ULTRA ATA but being thick(and handy at making screwdrivers fit weird screws) can anyone please explain the difference (if any)between ULTRA ATA and SATA and suggest a suitable reasonably priced enclosure.
Cheers NSC

Ultra ATA = IDE, the older type of connector. You can get adapters for both kinds easily enough.

I have a Trendnet enclosure that has both types of connectors inside, feck knows what it cost as I got it from spares in work. Does the job well.

 

[Shropshire Seagull]

SATA is serial connection = newer, faster and cheaper