My external hard disk has crashed, lost instruments

[mrjameskent]

Hi

Really hope someone here can help. My external hard drive has just been corrupted and I've lost all my samples, projects, everything. And I hadn't backed it up so I am a dumb motherf**ker I know.

I've also lost all the presets for my Live 7 Suite of instruments (operator, analog, electric and drum rack).

I have no idea how to go about getting this info back - I'm feeling a bit numb right now so would REALLY appreciate help.

Thanks
James

[anamexis]

Can you describe more in detail in what way your hard drive crashed?
Like, mechanical problem, some sort of data corruption?

[mrjameskent]

Can you describe more in detail in what way your hard drive crashed?
Like, mechanical problem, some sort of data corruption?

Its an external hard drive linked by firewire into my M-Audio Firewire Audiophile soundcard, which is linked by firewire to my Macbook laptop. Its been very buggy for a long time, sometimes not recognizing the external drive. I've been turning the soundcard on and off whilst its been connected to the machine, which I know you aren't supposed to do so its my own fault.

So I turned it on and off today, and it came up with a message saying it couldn't read the external disc, and it opened the disk utility; it would not repair or anything like that.

Could this be caused by the soundcard - its a relatively cheap one and seems to play up when trying to copy files from my hard drive to the external drive which is connected via the soundcard?

I've sorted out my instrument presets as well, re-downloaded them, just can't face going through it all again right now!

[anamexis]

Ok, that sounds like something that you have a pretty good chance of recovering from. But it might cost you - it sounds like data recovery software like this, this, this or this. Haven't tried any, so I can't recommend specifically... but a few of them have free trials to let you see if it will work.

But yeah, that kind of corruption is usually (at least partially) recoverable.
And it very well could have had something to do with your sound card and specifically the power cycling.

[mrjameskent]

(And it very well could have had something to do with your sound card and specifically the power cycling.[/quote]

I'm pretty sure my soundcard is the culprit - do you think an upgrade to a Presonus Firebox would help that? Don't trust using any of my external drives now!!!

[john doe by choice]

Maybe try a firewire hub instead of running your hard drive through your interface (although those usually require external power) - have you tried taking your interface out of the picture and plugging your hard drive straight into your computer? It could be an issue with your FW ports on your audiophile, or the cables you are using...I had a external acting up once and it turned out to be the cable - the drive would power up but not be recognized by the computer, but I switched cables and it went right back to work.

Whatever you try, have some DVDR's ready to burn whatever info you need - it may turn out that your external is ready to go, but by trying one of the things I mentioned, you may get one last push out of it.

[oblique strategies]

I'll vouch for Data Rescue II
http://www.prosoftengineering.com/produ ... rescue.php

Though these apps may not bring back everything, they can recover a lot. It's a bit of a gamble, but worth it.

[debu]

http://lifehacker.com/5237503/five-best ... very-tools

Hope you sort it man.

[paradiddle]

My HD crashed also recently and I've managed to salvage all my data with EASEUS Data Recovery. You should definitely give thoses recovery softwares a try.