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Mr Mushroom · Aug 30, 2005, 11:32 AM

I have a Lacie 250G external Hard Drive which I use with my Powerbook, and last week it stopped working. Basically what happened is that when i connected it to the powersource there was a very small whiff of blue/gray looking smoke that came from the front and it has not done anything since - won't spin, boot up or mount.

Now I have everything on this drive, and don't have any of it backed up, so this is quite a huge problem. I took it to my friend who claimed he would be able to get it working by connecting it up to his gadgets, but that did not work and he even tried putting it in the freezer (has anyone heard of this before?) but he tells me now he can not get it working at all.

What are my options? Does anyone know of a way to get it working?

I really could not care about the drive itself - it is still under warranty but that is not the issue that worries me. I need to get that data off of the drive, as everything I have is on there.

I have looked around on the internet and it seems as though there are quite a few Data recovery services that claim to be able to get info of of any disk, no matter how damaged.
Do I still have hope here, and how much will something like this cost?

I live in the Las Vegas area so would prefer to have someone there do it, as I can not afford to risk sending the drive out by mail really.

Please help - I have things on there that are irreplaceable - wedding photos etc

Thanks in advance for any input or help

Mush

angelmb · Aug 30, 2005, 12:08 PM

Doing this is going to avoid the warranty (so firstly I would contact with LaCie about the issue to get some advice) but you could open the case and place the hard disk inside a Power Mac and get the stuff from there. Maybe the hard disk is not really damaged and the smoke came from another internal component of the LaCie case or even it was the power supply.

What model is it?, a Porsche or a d2?

cleanup · Aug 30, 2005, 12:16 PM

I have to agree with angelmb. It might not even be the hard drive that's kaput, just the enclosure.

Aren't these things covered by warranty? You should at least be able to get support from LaCie, and maybe a new enclosure if that would happen to be the problem.

Mr Mushroom · Aug 30, 2005, 12:31 PM

I have this one (at least it looks like mine)

http://www.dealtime.com/xPF-250GB_LA...SK_MINI_10_100

My friend tried this:

taking out the internal enclosure (it was a Maxtor drive in there - is that normal?) and then putting that into a identical Lacie drive enclosure. This did not work.

Then he connected the internal Mxtor enclosure to various other drives but this still did not work.

Then the freezer thing, stilll nothing. PLus various different software programs.

The power light was still coming on on the drive so i dont think its power related.

When you say mount the disk on a Power Mac, do you mean actually opening up the internal Maxtor enclosure to get at the actual disk?

I have a friend back in Vegas that has a G5 so I could try this is if it is not too tricky to do - as you may have deduced I have limited skills in this area

As far as contacting Lacie - they told me that the drive is still under warranty, but I expect that I have voided that by opening it up anyway. Eitehr way I am reluctant to let it out of my sight till I Have my data back.

What do you think is the best thing to do?

Thanks very much for your help

angelmb · Aug 30, 2005, 12:52 PM

Originally Posted by Mr Mushroom

When you say mount the disk on a Power Mac, do you mean actually opening up the internal Maxtor enclosure to get at the actual disk?

I mean to open the LaCie enclosure so you can get the hard disk out and place it inside a Power Mac in the same way you place a new hard disk. I don't mean to open the hard disk to be able to see the plates, never do that.

Mr Mushroom · Aug 30, 2005, 01:09 PM

Ah okay I see now.

But as I have already tried attaching the hard disk to an identical Lacie Drive and another drive, doesnt this mean that the problem is indeed inside the hard disk itself rather than the enclosure? Or will the G5 stand more of a chance in getting it to boot?

angelmb · Aug 30, 2005, 04:04 PM

Double post, sorry.

angelmb · Aug 30, 2005, 04:05 PM

Before to try the hard disk with the Power Mac G5 you would like to know if the hard disk is ATA or SATA since I am not sure that the Power Mac G5 can use an 'old' ATA drive from factory (without third party solutions -pci cards-). I can get the drive out of my LaCie external FireWire Hard Disk and place it inside my G4 MDD, but they are ATA, not SATA, which is a newer standard implemented in the Power Mac G5 and some LaCie external hard drives, but since your external hard drive is an ATA hard disk inside a FireWire enclosure, you need to be sure about that fact.

Hairllama · Sep 10, 2005, 12:55 AM

The optical drive bus on the G5 is ATA, you could use that to attach the LaCie drive.

kerher · Oct 4, 2005, 09:39 PM

I noticed that no one is answering the question of how to get the FA Porsche drive case opened. I used 4 butter knives, 2 wedged in the sides and 2 in the front of the case vent holes to use as leverage to pull it open. the plastic is actually very pliable so no problems there. I have the USB 250gb model and it is ATA. Good luck on your problems.