Small flame coming from my PC

[Hyperion]

Stick it in the bath, turn on the taps and switch it on. Please let us know what happens.

Would be better in a Sync wouldn't it?

 

[dadams2k11]

The data can be recovered thats not a problem. As someone suggested you can get a hard drive caddy that will support IDE, & STA 2.5 & 3.5. They are around £10

 

[Hyperion]

Yep I am pretty sure this I have just dug out will do the job to recover anything off hard drive. Just need to remember how to remove the darn thing

 

[Bold Seagull]

I have a 2.5 inch hard drive enclosure that comes with a USB connector cable. I think you place the hard drive in the unit then connect via USB to new computer. Any good?

I've got a hard drive enclosure for a 3.5" SATA drive depending on what the drive is inside your laptop if it doesn't fit the 2.5". It's unused, still boxed, was going to stick it on ebay, but would be happy to let it go for a fiver.

(It is most likely a 2.5" coming out of a laptop though....depends how old the machine is).

 

[Hyperion]

I've got a hard drive enclosure for a 3.5" SATA drive depending on what the drive is inside your laptop if it doesn't fit the 2.5". It's unused, still boxed, was going to stick it on ebay, but would be happy to let it go for a fiver.

(It is most likely a 2.5" coming out of a laptop though....depends how old the machine is).

Cheers mate. The Laptop is only about 4 years old

 

[Mannakin]

Just an outside chance that it's dust that accumulated on the chip that ignited as the chip warmed up. If so, all will be fine. Pretty much any other reason I can think of means it's not good news....

It's very unlikely to be dust igniting as none of the components should get hot enough for this. More likely a capacitor as a previous poster mentioned.

Don't mess with it any more i.e. it isn't going to work again if you switch it on and you might just cause more damage.

Get a knowledgeable friend or professional who can remove the disk drive, make sure it is working and backup all your essential data BEFORE trying to repair it (if that is even feasible). It should be possible to remove the HDD and attach it to a desktop PC to read it if you know what you are doing.

It's a good reminder to any PC users - if something like this goes wrong on your PC, will you scream if you can't get the music/photo's documents back again? If so - make sure it is backed up. Buy an external HDD (£50 new) and back it up every month or so. Don't forget external HDD can fail too, so don't just store all your essential data on an external HDD without some way of backing THAT up.

PS Good luck!

 

[Hyperion]

It's very unlikely to be dust igniting as none of the components should get hot enough for this. More likely a capacitor as a previous poster mentioned.

Don't mess with it any more i.e. it isn't going to work again if you switch it on and you might just cause more damage.

Get a knowledgeable friend or professional who can remove the disk drive, make sure it is working and backup all your essential data BEFORE trying to repair it (if that is even feasible). It should be possible to remove the HDD and attach it to a desktop PC to read it if you know what you are doing.

It's a good reminder to any PC users - if something like this goes wrong on your PC, will you scream if you can't get the music/photo's documents back again? If so - make sure it is backed up. Buy an external HDD (£50 new) and back it up every month or so. Don't forget external HDD can fail too, so don't just store all your essential data on an external HDD without some way of backing THAT up.

PS Good luck!

Yep. Def buying one now. Good advice Sir

 

[Wozza]

Had a similar problem.

Engineer said it was a case of crap in the fan.

Problem is, he didn't tell me how often I need to do this. :-(

 

[Barrel of Fun]

How does one get data off an old hard drive?

I have one sitting in front of me and would love to rescue all my old uni photos.

Apologies for hijacking!

 

[Bold Seagull]

It's very unlikely to be dust igniting as none of the components should get hot enough for this. More likely a capacitor as a previous poster mentioned.

Don't mess with it any more i.e. it isn't going to work again if you switch it on and you might just cause more damage.

Get a knowledgeable friend or professional who can remove the disk drive, make sure it is working and backup all your essential data BEFORE trying to repair it (if that is even feasible). It should be possible to remove the HDD and attach it to a desktop PC to read it if you know what you are doing.

It's a good reminder to any PC users - if something like this goes wrong on your PC, will you scream if you can't get the music/photo's documents back again? If so - make sure it is backed up. Buy an external HDD (£50 new) and back it up every month or so. Don't forget external HDD can fail too, so don't just store all your essential data on an external HDD without some way of backing THAT up.

PS Good luck!

That is the very minimum backing up I would say.

I currently back up my documents and files to a cloud every hour to Sugarsync (other providers are available), I also back up the entire contents of the hard drive every hour to a locally connected hard drive, then I clone the HD every week onto a second hard drive which I keep out of the house, generally in the car (password protected of course).

The clone means that if the worse should happen and I'm burgled or the house burns down, I can get a new machine and simply clone my entire system back to a new computer exactly as it was literally within a couple of hours.

The cloud storage means my files are available and synced so can be accessed from any computer. The hourly backups mean if I experience a crash, or accidently delete a file, I can recover it from a previous back up.

Belt and braces with your data I say!

 

[public school boy]

Had a similar problem.

Engineer said it was a case of crap in the fan.

Problem is, he didn't tell me how often I need to do this. :-(

Better not crap in it again. Did you wash your hands afterwards?

 

[Bold Seagull]

How does one get data off an old hard drive?

I have one sitting in front of me and would love to rescue all my old uni photos.

Apologies for hijacking!

You need what looks like a 3.5" IDE enclosure / caddy (although you should definitely check!).

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/3-5-IDE-ATA-HDD-Hard-Drive-to-External-USB-2-0-Caddy-Case-Enclosure-/190685827481?pt=UK_Collectables_HardDriveEnclosures_RL&hash=item2c65c2d199

View attachment 46279

 

[kano]

That is the very minimum backing up I would say.

I currently back up my documents and files to a cloud every hour to Sugarsync (other providers are available), I also back up the entire contents of the hard drive every hour to a locally connected hard drive, then I clone the HD every week onto a second hard drive which I keep out of the house, generally in the car (password protected of course).

The clone means that if the worse should happen and I'm burgled or the house burns down, I can get a new machine and simply clone my entire system back to a new computer exactly as it was literally within a couple of hours.

The cloud storage means my files are available and synced so can be accessed from any computer. The hourly backups mean if I experience a crash, or accidently delete a file, I can recover it from a previous back up.

Belt and braces with your data I say!

You dd your hard drive once an hour? You need to set up a mirrored pair. Or chill out a bit

 

[Bold Seagull]

You dd your hard drive once an hour? You need to set up a mirrored pair. Or chill out a bit

Sorry, I should say it's all done automatically. Sugarsync runs in the background as does Time Machine (other back up applications are available).

Apart from the once a week clone, I don't do anything!

 

[happypig]

How does one get data off an old hard drive?

I have one sitting in front of me and would love to rescue all my old uni photos.

Apologies for hijacking!

I've got one of these : http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/USB-2-0-T...ing_Drive_Cables_Adapters&hash=item1e7e05d9d7 and it's come in handy many times. better than a caddy in my opinion as you can plug it in and get going in a few seconds.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Have you tried installing a firewall?

 

[Blue Valkyrie]

Stop using Firefox?