read past dud blocks (on hard disc)?

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:12:57 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 16:33:55 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , B00ze/Empire
writes
On 2014-10-12 12:45, Paul wrote:

What isn't
recommended, is opening the drive in your dusty
living room, with absolutely no advanced preparation.
Even if you take the drive into a cabinet, you should
clean the outside of it a bit first, before opening it
up.

I haven't done it in a long time, but I once opened a 170MB drive -
yes, a looong time ago - and blew compressed air on the platters, as
there was a small piece of plastic or two floating around there giving
fake read errors when they hit the heads. Anyways, this was all done
"in my dusty living room" and I had no issues afterwards :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPEa0Wc9iUc
"How to Make a Clean Air Enclosure (for HDD repair etc)"

That was impressive - thanks.

This is another of his videos, and shows him sorting out the internals
of the hard drive, and getting it to work well enough to recover the
data.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5Y7BniaRXg
Unlike an awful lot of similar 'how to' videos, his speech is
crystal-clear (at least to a British ear!), and his speed of
presentation is just right.

His speech is also very clear to an American ear, although I can't guess
where in England he is from, since I am not versed in the accents &
dialects of the UK.

So far I only watched the first video, and I think his presentation
there is also very clear. Refreshing, compared to many that I've watched
:-)

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 15:18:44 -0400, Paul wrote:

Gene E. Bloch wrote:
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 16:33:55 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , B00ze/Empire
writes
On 2014-10-12 12:45, Paul wrote:

What isn't
recommended, is opening the drive in your dusty
living room, with absolutely no advanced preparation.
Even if you take the drive into a cabinet, you should
clean the outside of it a bit first, before opening it
up.
I haven't done it in a long time, but I once opened a 170MB drive -
yes, a looong time ago - and blew compressed air on the platters, as
there was a small piece of plastic or two floating around there giving
fake read errors when they hit the heads. Anyways, this was all done
"in my dusty living room" and I had no issues afterwards :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPEa0Wc9iUc
"How to Make a Clean Air Enclosure (for HDD repair etc)"

That was impressive - thanks.


Yeah, that's the same glove box design they
use for working on Ebola samples.

Are they also made up of cardboard and duct tape?

Rather than putting that cardboard box under negative
pressure, the hepafilter could be providing positive
pressure on the source end. That causes air leakage to
move out of the box, through whatever "gaps" exist
around the "gloves" area. Then you can leave the fan running
while you work.

Paul

As long as you are pumping clean air in. But yes, I agree.

Someone on the news or in a magazine article recently spoke of keeping a
biological isolation chamber under negative pressure and called doing
that "counterintuitive". Oh well.

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 14:03:23 -0700, "Gene E. Bloch"
wrote:

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:12:57 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 16:33:55 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , B00ze/Empire
writes
On 2014-10-12 12:45, Paul wrote:

What isn't
recommended, is opening the drive in your dusty
living room, with absolutely no advanced preparation.
Even if you take the drive into a cabinet, you should
clean the outside of it a bit first, before opening it
up.

I haven't done it in a long time, but I once opened a 170MB drive -
yes, a looong time ago - and blew compressed air on the platters, as
there was a small piece of plastic or two floating around there giving
fake read errors when they hit the heads. Anyways, this was all done
"in my dusty living room" and I had no issues afterwards :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPEa0Wc9iUc
"How to Make a Clean Air Enclosure (for HDD repair etc)"

That was impressive - thanks.

This is another of his videos, and shows him sorting out the internals
of the hard drive, and getting it to work well enough to recover the
data.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5Y7BniaRXg
Unlike an awful lot of similar 'how to' videos, his speech is
crystal-clear (at least to a British ear!), and his speed of
presentation is just right.

His speech is also very clear to an American ear, although I can't guess
where in England he is from, since I am not versed in the accents &
dialects of the UK.

So far I only watched the first video, and I think his presentation
there is also very clear. Refreshing, compared to many that I've watched
:-)


This looks very good to me, too. If I wanted such a thing, I'd follow
his instructions and build what he built. But since I'm all thumbs and
don't want to even try going inside a drive, I won't.

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 14:33:07 -0700, Ken Blake, MVP wrote:

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 14:03:23 -0700, "Gene E. Bloch"
wrote:

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:12:57 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 16:33:55 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , B00ze/Empire
writes
On 2014-10-12 12:45, Paul wrote:

What isn't
recommended, is opening the drive in your dusty
living room, with absolutely no advanced preparation.
Even if you take the drive into a cabinet, you should
clean the outside of it a bit first, before opening it
up.

I haven't done it in a long time, but I once opened a 170MB drive -
yes, a looong time ago - and blew compressed air on the platters, as
there was a small piece of plastic or two floating around there giving
fake read errors when they hit the heads. Anyways, this was all done
"in my dusty living room" and I had no issues afterwards :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPEa0Wc9iUc
"How to Make a Clean Air Enclosure (for HDD repair etc)"

That was impressive - thanks.

This is another of his videos, and shows him sorting out the internals
of the hard drive, and getting it to work well enough to recover the
data.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5Y7BniaRXg
Unlike an awful lot of similar 'how to' videos, his speech is
crystal-clear (at least to a British ear!), and his speed of
presentation is just right.

His speech is also very clear to an American ear, although I can't guess
where in England he is from, since I am not versed in the accents &
dialects of the UK.

So far I only watched the first video, and I think his presentation
there is also very clear. Refreshing, compared to many that I've watched
:-)

This looks very good to me, too. If I wanted such a thing, I'd follow
his instructions and build what he built. But since I'm all thumbs and
don't want to even try going inside a drive, I won't.

Since my post, I watched the second video that Ian pointed to, where
Matt unstick a hard drive by opening it *without* using a clean chamber
and then mechanically unsticking it, with no apparent harm done by the
exposure to room air.

But given what you said, you won't want to do that either.

I might do it, not to fix a drive, but to see the insides for my own
edification. For repair, I'm not that confident either...

BTW the second video is also clear, both in his speech and in his
presentation.

I tracked him down to here,
http://www.instructables.com/member/DIYPerks/

and learned that he is either 22 years old or was 22 in 2012. Pretty
good!

I like smart people...

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes



Since my post, I watched the second video that Ian pointed to, where
Matt unstick a hard drive by opening it *without* using a clean chamber
and then mechanically unsticking it, with no apparent harm done by the
exposure to room air.

From what he said in the disk repair video, he hadn't yet made the clean
chamber - but was thinking about it.






--
Ian

In article , lid
says...

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 14:33:07 -0700, Ken Blake, MVP wrote:

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 14:03:23 -0700, "Gene E. Bloch"
wrote:

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:12:57 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 16:33:55 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , B00ze/Empire
writes
On 2014-10-12 12:45, Paul wrote:

What isn't
recommended, is opening the drive in your dusty
living room, with absolutely no advanced preparation.
Even if you take the drive into a cabinet, you should
clean the outside of it a bit first, before opening it
up.

I haven't done it in a long time, but I once opened a 170MB drive -
yes, a looong time ago - and blew compressed air on the platters, as
there was a small piece of plastic or two floating around there giving
fake read errors when they hit the heads. Anyways, this was all done
"in my dusty living room" and I had no issues afterwards :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPEa0Wc9iUc
"How to Make a Clean Air Enclosure (for HDD repair etc)"

That was impressive - thanks.

This is another of his videos, and shows him sorting out the internals
of the hard drive, and getting it to work well enough to recover the
data.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5Y7BniaRXg
Unlike an awful lot of similar 'how to' videos, his speech is
crystal-clear (at least to a British ear!), and his speed of
presentation is just right.

His speech is also very clear to an American ear, although I can't guess
where in England he is from, since I am not versed in the accents &
dialects of the UK.

So far I only watched the first video, and I think his presentation
there is also very clear. Refreshing, compared to many that I've watched
:-)


If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:05:31 -0300, pjp wrote:

If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

Can be dangerous...

I'm thinking of the very unusual situation where someone manages to
swallow a very powerful small magnet, and manages with the help of
another similar magnet to perforate part of the digestive tract.

I've heard of this, but not recently, so I don't have any details at
hand - especially the possibly significant one of whether it has ever
actually happened :-)

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 16:24:07 -0700, "Gene E. Bloch"
wrote:

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:05:31 -0300, pjp wrote:

If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

Can be dangerous...

I'm thinking of the very unusual situation where someone manages to
swallow a very powerful small magnet, and manages with the help of
another similar magnet to perforate part of the digestive tract.

I've heard of this, but not recently, so I don't have any details at
hand - especially the possibly significant one of whether it has ever
actually happened :-)


Sounds to me like an urban legend. But that's just a guess--I don't
know.

In article , not-
lid says...

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:05:31 -0300, pjp wrote:

If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

Can be dangerous...

I'm thinking of the very unusual situation where someone manages to
swallow a very powerful small magnet, and manages with the help of
another similar magnet to perforate part of the digestive tract.

I've heard of this, but not recently, so I don't have any details at
hand - especially the possibly significant one of whether it has ever
actually happened :-)

That was an issue with those kids toys that were magnetic balls would
form into all kinds of shapes. Kids would swallow them and with a few
going thru tract they would attract each other thru the curves in the
intestine wall hence blocking it. They were recalled I'm sure and taken
off the market.

Same thing in a larger size too big to swallow would be neat but I
suspect expensive, e.g. 1' across balls.

Gene E. Bloch wrote:
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 15:18:44 -0400, Paul wrote:

Gene E. Bloch wrote:
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 16:33:55 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:

In message , B00ze/Empire
writes
On 2014-10-12 12:45, Paul wrote:

What isn't
recommended, is opening the drive in your dusty
living room, with absolutely no advanced preparation.
Even if you take the drive into a cabinet, you should
clean the outside of it a bit first, before opening it
up.
I haven't done it in a long time, but I once opened a 170MB drive -
yes, a looong time ago - and blew compressed air on the platters, as
there was a small piece of plastic or two floating around there giving
fake read errors when they hit the heads. Anyways, this was all done
"in my dusty living room" and I had no issues afterwards :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPEa0Wc9iUc
"How to Make a Clean Air Enclosure (for HDD repair etc)"
That was impressive - thanks.

Yeah, that's the same glove box design they
use for working on Ebola samples.

Are they also made up of cardboard and duct tape?

Rather than putting that cardboard box under negative
pressure, the hepafilter could be providing positive
pressure on the source end. That causes air leakage to
move out of the box, through whatever "gaps" exist
around the "gloves" area. Then you can leave the fan running
while you work.

Paul

As long as you are pumping clean air in. But yes, I agree.

Someone on the news or in a magazine article recently spoke of keeping a
biological isolation chamber under negative pressure and called doing
that "counterintuitive". Oh well.


Ebola, I'd keep that under negative pressure, pulling the
gloves inside the glove box. I wouldn't want any biologicals
blowing out through cracks in the box. And you want your
vacuum cleaner to vent... outdoors.

But for the hard drive, I'd want positive pressure. Especially
as the "glove port" isn't really sealed at all. if you're making
it out of cardboard, might as well be positive pressure, considering
the level of leakage.

Paul

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:05:31 -0300, pjp wrote:

If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

Each of the magnets is actually two magnets side by side. Put the end
of one of them into the middle of the other. I was trying to work out
how they worked with the coil and accidently slid one across the other
and it stuck in the middle explaining everything. You have current
flowing in one direction on one side of the coil and in the other
direction on the other side so the magnetic field has to be reversed
for it to work and I was scratching my head until I discovered the two
magnets :-)


--
Faster, cheaper, quieter than HS2
and built in 5 years;
UKUltraspeed http://www.500kmh.com/

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes:
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 14:33:07 -0700, Ken Blake, MVP wrote:
[]
This looks very good to me, too. If I wanted such a thing, I'd follow
his instructions and build what he built. But since I'm all thumbs and
don't want to even try going inside a drive, I won't.

I didn't _want_ to either, but it came down to either discarding the
data on the stuck drive or paying a data recovery company (and there
were things on the drive - not least, of course, credit card numbers,
probably - I wouldn't trust a recovery company not to keep copies of).
[]
I might do it, not to fix a drive, but to see the insides for my own
edification. For repair, I'm not that confident either...

It _was_ moderately interesting. (In particular, that the surfaces
appear shiny metal, rather than brown magnetic.)
[]
I like smart people...

Ditto.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"What happens if I press this button?" "I wouldn't ..." (pinggg!) "Oh!" "What
happened?" "A sign lit up, saying `please do not press this button
again'!"(s1f2)

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes:
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:05:31 -0300, pjp wrote:

If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

Can be dangerous...

I'm thinking of the very unusual situation where someone manages to
swallow a very powerful small magnet, and manages with the help of
another similar magnet to perforate part of the digestive tract.

I've heard of this, but not recently, so I don't have any details at
hand - especially the possibly significant one of whether it has ever
actually happened :-)

ISTR hearing/reading of someone who'd got part of his anatomy (yes, that
part, I think) trapped between two powerful magnets - can't remember if
from HDD, I think they were. The hospital did eventually manage to
separate them. (Are they a shape that would tempt one to ...?)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"What happens if I press this button?" "I wouldn't ..." (pinggg!) "Oh!" "What
happened?" "A sign lit up, saying `please do not press this button
again'!"(s1f2)

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 22:11:18 -0300, pjp wrote:

In article , not-
lid says...

On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:05:31 -0300, pjp wrote:

If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

Can be dangerous...

I'm thinking of the very unusual situation where someone manages to
swallow a very powerful small magnet, and manages with the help of
another similar magnet to perforate part of the digestive tract.

I've heard of this, but not recently, so I don't have any details at
hand - especially the possibly significant one of whether it has ever
actually happened :-)

That was an issue with those kids toys that were magnetic balls would
form into all kinds of shapes. Kids would swallow them and with a few
going thru tract they would attract each other thru the curves in the
intestine wall hence blocking it. They were recalled I'm sure and taken
off the market.

Same thing in a larger size too big to swallow would be neat but I
suspect expensive, e.g. 1' across balls.

Thanks for the clarification. That *is* what I had heard about, but
(obviously) couldn't recall accurately without your help.

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)

On Fri, 24 Oct 2014 07:44:30 +0100, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

In message , Gene E. Bloch
writes:
On Thu, 23 Oct 2014 20:05:31 -0300, pjp wrote:

If you take one apart, take the two magnets out and play with them. They
way they act towards one another might surprise you. BTW - they are very
powerfull magnets.

Can be dangerous...

I'm thinking of the very unusual situation where someone manages to
swallow a very powerful small magnet, and manages with the help of
another similar magnet to perforate part of the digestive tract.

I've heard of this, but not recently, so I don't have any details at
hand - especially the possibly significant one of whether it has ever
actually happened :-)

ISTR hearing/reading of someone who'd got part of his anatomy (yes, that
part, I think) trapped between two powerful magnets - can't remember if
from HDD, I think they were. The hospital did eventually manage to
separate them. (Are they a shape that would tempt one to ...?)

I'm glad I read this early in the day, so I have a chance to forget
about before I start dreaming tonight :-)

--
Gene E. Bloch (Stumbling Bloch)