How a "little browser problem" destroyed weekend..

[lostinisaan]

       I sat at Mitsubishi and got my brakes checked when a Thai friend I had upgraded his PC to W 10 a few months ago, called me that he had a little problem with Google.

 

          Okay, right after Mitsu a visit at his shop and it was easy to get the browser hijackers fixed, but it turned out that the hard drive was at its end and needed replacement.

 

          It sometimes booted okay, but took a long time and I could feel and hear when the hard drive was searching for files. I told him that I'd buy one, a 500 GB WD and I also bought a case and came back the next day.

   I booted the PC, deleted some games from his daughter, but the drive got worse and a restart was almost impossible.

 

            I've tried all, but couldn't boot it once more to clone the hard drive. A black screen and the cursor visible, one time I could start it up but when I clicked on Macrium, I couldn't even start the program and the cursor turned around for 20 minutes, until I shut it down and tried a restart, but no way. 

 

    I gave up after many hours as he needed many files and programs on his PC and I wasn't into a new set up anyway.

     

I did this guy a favor and neither asked for money when I upgraded his machine, nor when I tried to clone the drive. 

 

    I finally sent him to a guy who should be able to clone it, will hear this evening what happened. All in all a very annoying experience. 

 

  Here my question for the specialists:    Can you clone a hard drive that has some bad sectors on a new one without having problems afterwards? When I first checked on the machine it seemed easy to clone the drive, but a program called hard drive Sentinel showed a rapid loss of life from 81 down to 50 something. 

 

        Would cloning such a drive also clone any bad sectors? Thanks for any advice. 

 

      

 

      

 

         

 

 

 

        

[Chicog]

See if you can find a copy of Gibson's SpinRite. It should be able to get the drive back into a state where the data can be copied.

[lostinisaan]

7 hours ago, Chicog said:

See if you can find a copy of Gibson's SpinRite. It should be able to get the drive back into a state where the data can be copied.

 

  I just came back from my friend's place and the thingy is running well. 

 

      Everything is set up, he only needs to insert the hd, switch the clone program on and he'll have an identical copy.

 

         It seems that one DDR 2 memory card didn't work on the weekend and I wasn't really thinking to check it again after cleaning them twice.

 

        The hd is in an enclosure and he can't make much wrong. Even if it takes many hours, everything looks good now.

 

         Thanks for your tip, I couldn't believe my eyes when i saw the functioning PC. The HD Sentimental dropped to 60 something percent, should be good enough to do the clone.

 

         Thanks again and cheers-    

 

  P.S. That's from a guy who wrote some good points about the guy who invented the program: (PB)

 

    

DogNo7 at 2009-08-08 23:49 CET:

Steve Gibson is a complete git.

And as for his security podcast...

He understands less about computer security than the tiddledinks that wrote that piece of cow flop movie "Hackers".

This program is the only thing Steve Gibson has ever done that was worthwhile, once upon a time.

However, even this program was a ripoff of earlier work by Kolod research.

Don't buy this. Just download it.

You'll feel better, and it is one of 1000 things you will never use.

        

[Chicog]

16 minutes ago, lostinisaan said:

 

  I just came back from my friend's place and the thingy is running well. 

 

      Everything is set up, he only needs to insert the hd, switch the clone program on and he'll have an identical copy.

 

         It seems that one DDR 2 memory card didn't work on the weekend and I wasn't really thinking to check it again after cleaning them twice.

 

        The hd is in an enclosure and he can't make much wrong. Even if it takes many hours, everything looks good now.

 

         Thanks for your tip, I couldn't believe my eyes when i saw the functioning PC. The HD Sentimental dropped to 60 something percent, should be good enough to do the clone.

 

         Thanks again and cheers-    

 

  P.S. That's from a guy who wrote some good points about the guy who invented the program: (PB)

 

    

DogNo7 at 2009-08-08 23:49 CET:

Steve Gibson is a complete git.

And as for his security podcast...

He understands less about computer security than the tiddledinks that wrote that piece of cow flop movie "Hackers".

This program is the only thing Steve Gibson has ever done that was worthwhile, once upon a time.

However, even this program was a ripoff of earlier work by Kolod research.

Don't buy this. Just download it.

You'll feel better, and it is one of 1000 things you will never use.

        

 

"Dog" pretty well sums that up.

 

 

[eTiMaGo]

Hack the gibson!

 

Seriously, HDD failures always give me nightmares, glad to hear things worked out!

[SoiBiker]

I'd have stopped trying to boot it as soon as I realised the drive was dying. Boot up from a Linux live CD and use ddrescue to clone the drive. It'll work round the errors the first pass, then retry them as many times as you like, chipping away at the dodgy areas from both sides to retrieve the maximum data. I've used it to recover a properly messed up drive and saved a couple TB of data whilst only losing a few files, and the filesystem mounted cleanly.

[lostinisaan]

On 8/31/2016 at 8:34 PM, SoiBiker said:

I'd have stopped trying to boot it as soon as I realised the drive was dying. Boot up from a Linux live CD and use ddrescue to clone the drive. It'll work round the errors the first pass, then retry them as many times as you like, chipping away at the dodgy areas from both sides to retrieve the maximum data. I've used it to recover a properly messed up drive and saved a couple TB of data whilst only losing a few files, and the filesystem mounted cleanly.

 

   It all seemed to be the hd that didn't boot, or at least so slowly that it was impossible to clone the drive.

 

          But it seems that a DDR 2 memory card wasn't working and caused the machine to act so weird.

 

             That's just my theory, I checked on it two days ago, told the guy to do the clone now and not on a week, but he seems to think all is fine.

 

   You can hear the hd searching for files and folders, so really time to replace it. Thanks for the replies. 

[chrisinth]

On 8/31/2016 at 11:42 AM, lostinisaan said:

It sometimes booted okay, but took a long time and I could feel and hear when the hard drive was searching for files. I told him that I'd buy one, a 500 GB WD and I also bought a case and came back the next day.

 

On 8/31/2016 at 11:42 AM, lostinisaan said:

Would cloning such a drive also clone any bad sectors?

 

It actually looks like your friend is heading towards a hard drive failure rather than having bad sectors. To keep your options open (while the drive appears to be functioning normally) in addition to cloning the disk, i would also do a full image backup as well. If for some reason the clone fails, you can always try the image backup method on a new drive, through a boot CD (if your backup software has this option) or install any OS on the new drive, install the backup software and run the image.

 

And don't forget his additional partitions if he has any on the image backup....................

[lostinisaan]

3 hours ago, chrisinth said:

 

 

It actually looks like your friend is heading towards a hard drive failure rather than having bad sectors. To keep your options open (while the drive appears to be functioning normally) in addition to cloning the disk, i would also do a full image backup as well. If for some reason the clone fails, you can always try the image backup method on a new drive, through a boot CD (if your backup software has this option) or install any OS on the new drive, install the backup software and run the image.

 

And don't forget his additional partitions if he has any on the image backup....................

 

   I did install Macrium ( Chicog will let me know what he's thinking about it soon. lol) and used my own memory drive to be able to boot it if things go bad.

 

   It's possible that the drive has to be initialized as I remember that I've tried the new hd on my PC at home when I put it into its enclosure and it's possible that my PC already gave it a drive letter. ( sorry, I did that then..)

 

I guess that will make the drive invisible for the other PC? 

 

   To back it up on one of my external ones, I'd have to delete a lot of important stuff and I've told him how important the clone is. HD Sentinel isn't lying, once it showed me a life spam of two weeks and that was exactly the time I had with it.

 

        I'll stop on my way home from school, anyway it's on my way and see if the guy's there. I even forgot to check the CD key, so if the hd fails now, it would be strange after putting in so much work.

 

    When I worked on it you could feel the hd searching for files and you could hear some noise, not loud, but it's getting to its end, 5 years old and always used for games and bs by his daughters.

 

      Should he be there, I'll start the process for g\him and might save the CD key, as it's a genuine one, from a W 7 update.

 

          Thanks  a lot for the posts and enjoy your weekend. I for my part know that I won't try to fix PC's this one.

 

         Keep on smiling and rocking. Life can be shorter than expected. 

 

   P.S., Stupid me, I could make a drive C System Back up, might be 50 GB, not more. 

 

   Thanks again. 

 

       . 

 

     

 

        

[chrisinth]

1 hour ago, lostinisaan said:

 

   I did install Macrium ( Chicog will let me know what he's thinking about it soon. lol) and used my own memory drive to be able to boot it if things go bad.

 

   It's possible that the drive has to be initialized as I remember that I've tried the new hd on my PC at home when I put it into its enclosure and it's possible that my PC already gave it a drive letter. ( sorry, I did that then..)

 

I guess that will make the drive invisible for the other PC? 

 

   To back it up on one of my external ones, I'd have to delete a lot of important stuff and I've told him how important the clone is. HD Sentinel isn't lying, once it showed me a life spam of two weeks and that was exactly the time I had with it.

 

        I'll stop on my way home from school, anyway it's on my way and see if the guy's there. I even forgot to check the CD key, so if the hd fails now, it would be strange after putting in so much work.

 

    When I worked on it you could feel the hd searching for files and you could hear some noise, not loud, but it's getting to its end, 5 years old and always used for games and bs by his daughters.

 

      Should he be there, I'll start the process for g\him and might save the CD key, as it's a genuine one, from a W 7 update.

 

          Thanks  a lot for the posts and enjoy your weekend. I for my part know that I won't try to fix PC's this one.

 

         Keep on smiling and rocking. Life can be shorter than expected. 

 

   P.S., Stupid me, I could make a drive C System Back up, might be 50 GB, not more. 

 

   Thanks again. 

 

       . 

 

     

 

        

 

One of the easier ways to get the install key that I use is to install Belarc Advisor (audit software), run it and look under the Software Licenses link (left side top). This will show you which version of operating system you have installed along with the 25 digit install key.

 

If you are doing a fresh install and plan to use the key, make sure you have the correct version of 7 (retail, VLK, etc) (home, pro, ent., etc) otherwise the key will not be recognized when activating.

 

Free software, the link is:

http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html 

[lostinisaan]

27 minutes ago, chrisinth said:

 

One of the easier ways to get the install key that I use is to install Belarc Advisor (audit software), run it and look under the Software Licenses link (left side top). This will show you which version of operating system you have installed along with the 25 digit install key.

 

If you are doing a fresh install and plan to use the key, make sure you have the correct version of 7 (retail, VLK, etc) (home, pro, ent., etc) otherwise the key will not be recognized when activating.

 

Free software, the link is:

http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html 

 

 Thanks a a lot and again. It's W 10 Pro, the 1511 version and I was planning to use Belarc, a fantastic program that a poster on this forum a few years ago recommended.

 

   The biggest problem is that the guy's Thai, I'm not doing it for money and he doesn't seem to understand what the drop ro minus 60 % really means.

 

        I hope I can reduce my stop to a short Leo, he's got the coldest beer in town and I really wanna get over it before it's too late.

 

       It turned out that both his kids where my students at a primary school eleven years ago, so I'm not just doing him a favor. I'll get the key, save it on my thumb drive and try to start the cloning process today.

 

    Khop Khun Maal Khrap !!! 

 

    P.S. I haven't had other products than W 10 pro yet, a super teacher st my school entered an Enterprise key on a machine that had Pro on. But of course not activated.

 

   I spoke to the Lord Buddha and it was, it's eve updated to the 1607 version now.

 

  I need some distance to PC's and notebooks now. Beer in around 50 minutes...

 

    

 

         

 

     

 

  

[lvr181]

18 hours ago, lostinisaan said:

 

 Thanks a a lot and again. It's W 10 Pro, the 1511 version and I was planning to use Belarc, a fantastic program that a poster on this forum a few years ago recommended.

 

   The biggest problem is that the guy's Thai, I'm not doing it for money and he doesn't seem to understand what the drop ro minus 60 % really means.

 

        I hope I can reduce my stop to a short Leo, he's got the coldest beer in town and I really wanna get over it before it's too late.

 

       It turned out that both his kids where my students at a primary school eleven years ago, so I'm not just doing him a favor. I'll get the key, save it on my thumb drive and try to start the cloning process today.

 

    Khop Khun Maal Khrap !!! 

 

    P.S. I haven't had other products than W 10 pro yet, a super teacher st my school entered an Enterprise key on a machine that had Pro on. But of course not activated.

 

   I spoke to the Lord Buddha and it was, it's eve updated to the 1607 version now.

 

  I need some distance to PC's and notebooks now. Beer in around 50 minutes...

 

    

 

         

 

     

 

  

What ever happens, get your priorities right and drink that beer while it is still cold (and without ice in it to spoil the taste - sacrilege)

[lostinisaan]

19 minutes ago, lvr181 said:

What ever happens, get your priorities right and drink that beer while it is still cold (and without ice in it to spoil the taste - sacrilege)

 

      Beer is always cold because I usually drink it in small bottles.And that has to be fast enough before it gets warm. 

 

The Germish blood in me tells me no, no no, certainly no ice cubes in beer. It's a sin and I'm a bloody atheist. No beer-water, I like beer. 

 

The PC just said no to my attempts clone it and made me to a clown.

 

        But no problems with that, I'm a full time clown from Monday to Friday from 8 to 4.30 anyway. 

 

         The USB cloning using Macrium didn't work out and stopped at 3 %. It might be worth to connect it directly via Sata and power cables and using a different program? 

 

    

[golfer1111]

On 8/31/2016 at 8:34 PM, SoiBiker said:

I'd have stopped trying to boot it as soon as I realised the drive was dying. Boot up from a Linux live CD and use ddrescue to clone the drive. It'll work round the errors the first pass, then retry them as many times as you like, chipping away at the dodgy areas from both sides to retrieve the maximum data. I've used it to recover a properly messed up drive and saved a couple TB of data whilst only losing a few files, and the filesystem mounted cleanly.

 

Try SoiBiker's suggestion. I'm not a linux guy but this isn't that hard.

 

It's easy to make a linux boot disk & ddrescue has pretty clear instructions. I used it to clone a Tivo drive that was failing, it worked well.

[keithathome]

At tines like these don't you just curse the fact you don't have a second HDD ?  OS on one, data on t'other. Just dump the faulty drive, buy new, reinstall OS and you're good to go with no data recovery needed. 

[kekalot]

On 2016-09-04 at 7:10 PM, keithathome said:

At tines like these don't you just curse the fact you don't have a second HDD ?  OS on one, data on t'other. Just dump the faulty drive, buy new, reinstall OS and you're good to go with no data recovery needed. 

 

everyone should have that, at least 2 hard drives.

mostly a problem for laptop users, I guess but then again, not hard to fix with an external USB drive.

 

 

[SoiBiker]

Or just keep decent backups. 

[lostinisaan]

On 9/6/2016 at 9:28 PM, SoiBiker said:

Or just keep decent backups. 

 

 If the person knows how to make back ups.....

[SoiBiker]

Everyone that uses a computer should know how to make backups. 

[chrisinth]

At tines like these don't you just curse the fact you don't have a second HDD ?  OS on one, data on t'other. Just dump the faulty drive, buy new, reinstall OS and you're good to go with no data recovery needed. 

OK if you don't have additional software installed, like MS Office for example. Yes, you can chose to install it to a location on your second drive, but the registry of your new install on your replaced 'system' disk won't recognize it.

Same goes for all installed software that isn't self contained (portable).

Take an image and keep it current...

[lostinisaan]

On 9/8/2016 at 7:15 PM, SoiBiker said:

Everyone that uses a computer should know how to make backups. 

 

    Only guessing, a lot of people do not know how to make a back up. I bet 100,000 Lao Kip on that...even one million. 

[SoiBiker]

No. But they should.