I live in a remote part of this country and I am considering investing in
Data Recovery Software.  The price of sending hard drives to a major city
for recovery is very steep.  This thread brought some questions to mind.  Do
our listers have suggestions which company makes the best  for the price?
For the problem below, would it be better to try using Norton DiskDoctor
(NDD.EXE) first before recovery or not to use it at all?  I suspect the
drive is still ok, just maybe a scrambled start up BOOT.INI and the file
system is really NTFS and not visible to Windows9X.  A somewhat related
problem here, how can I view a customers HD formated with Netware 3.1 and
recover data from it?.  I have no experience with this filke system.
Thanks.
Howard Rubin
Fortaleza, Brazil

RE:  Date:    Wed, 26 Mar 2003 22:22:13 -0500
From:    Ken Shearer <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: HDD Data Recovery

Worked on Client's Win XP HE machine today which had a Quantum Fireball EX
10.2 AT HDD formatted as FAT-32.  Machine would not boot.  After each
unsuccessful boot, the black boot screen offering to restart in three
configs of "Safe Mode," Normal Startup, and "Last Known Good..." comes up.
Regardless of which you choose, the machine restarts again without further
effort to actually boot.

Ended up replacing her HDD, got her system restored, and brought the old HDD
home to hook as a slave on one of our other PCs in an effort to recover the
data (it's been ages since she had backed this drive up).  When I start my
machine, the black bootup screen shows her drive as the slave on IDE-0 and
identifies it correctly.  However, after Windows starts, you don't see the
drive at all when you go to Windows Explorer.

Anybody out there know how I can get her data back for her without spending
oodles for data recover software or professional services?

Thanks!

Ken Shearer, [log in to unmask]

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