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February 20, 2007
Computers, don't you just love their little ways .....
About six months ago I bought a "Portable Drive" with 50 Gb of storage space on it. Great, I thought, now I can carry my working files around with me and work on them where ever. I could even find space to download and copy all the stuff I had accumulated on my computer at work before I retired - taking care that I took only the stuff that was my own and nothing that was theirs! The result was that I had the means to carry my presentations, my book drafts and a whole load of useful and irreplaceable information that I use all the time with me.
Most of it was "backed up" on other machines, drives and sticks. Most of it.
Yesterday the Portable Drive ceased to function. My desktop can "see" that it is there, but cannot "read" any of the information on it. This is when you discover that what you thought you had stored on other drives and machines isn't. Ninety-nine percent of it is, the one percent that is vital isn't - including the draft of a technical book I have been writing for the last eight months.
A visit to a hardware fixer and data retriever was my first step. He has done his best, he tested everything on it and in it. He has tried inserting it into a laptop as the "main" drive, he has tried to breathe life back into the device, to no avail, my Portable Drive is now, like John Cleese's parrot, an "ex-Portable Drive". It appears that there is a tiny motor inside the thing which allows the disc to spin and be read. The motor turns but the disc doesn't and as it is sealed there is no way to discover why without destroying it entirely.
The supplier is sympathetic - bring it in and we'll exchange ot for a new one. Fine, but I have still lost almost 30 Gb of data ........
I could weep, but it will serve no purpose whatever. A lesson learned the hardest way possible I think!
Posted by The Gray Monk at February 20, 2007 04:37 PM
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