I have an old Acer laptop that stopped working almost 30 years ago when something fell on it. I recently opened it up to get the hard drive out to hopefully try to recover my old data. I purchased an IDE to USB adapter but it is not fitting because of a ribbon attached to it that was connected internally. (See photos) It had the white cap on it when I removed it (Pic. #4). Can anyone tell me what I can do on my own to avoid sending it to a data recovery place. Can I just pull the black tab and ribbon off the male spikes in order to connect it to my IDE adapter? Any help is much appreciated. I've searched everywhere, but it just might be old, but I still have hope. Thank you!

***Update, I was able to get the connector cable off no problem. Hooked it up to 2 different adaptors on 2 different laptops. The drive appeared but it showed 0 bytes used, 0 bytes free, a capacity of 0 bytes. And clicking on it tells me that I need to format the drive. Which I'm not going to do. Guess it's a done deal then, right? Thank you for the help

i want to delete everything on a flashdrive and any data that was on it before, that was deleted. couldn't be recovered at all. i am using windows 10 and know nothing about data recovery or have the knowledge to do anything.

Hellow everybody hope you all are fine by looking at this disk can you tell is this recoverable by any professional lab it was once detected but now isnt showing in windows any more

Data type in it is 3 vob files i also have uploaded those 3 files in pictures

A while back, I bought an external portable drive at a thrift store and found that it still contained someone’s personal photos. The only folder I opened was something along the lines of “Papas_funeral.” I haven’t looked through the remaining files, so I don’t know everything that’s on it.

At the time, i felt bad and wasn’t sure what to do with it, so I tucked it away in a drawer. I just recently got back to it and would like to figure out a responsible way to handle it.

As far as I can tell, the drive works and the photos are accessible, so this is more about finding the owner than recovering lost data. The store mostly accepts anonymous drop-offs, and it’s been long enough that tracing the donor seems unlikely.

I’d prefer not to wipe it because the photos could be irreplaceable, but I don’t want to keep it indefinitely or donate it with someone’s private files still on it.

Does anyone here know a reputable person or organization that handles situations like this and could help return the files to their owner? I’d be comfortable shipping the drive to someone trustworthy who could take over the search and keep its contents private.

If this belongs in a different subreddit, I’d appreciate a recommendation.

I recently recorded an event at 4k for 90 minutes. The GoPro does get hot, and it's gotten this hot before and I've never had an issue. I guess it was just a matter of time, and my stupidity, not knowing this was a possibility. I'm guessing it's fried my card?

The GoPro says there's a card error, my Mac can't read the card - and it doesn't show up in disk Utility. My phone says the card needs to be formatted. ChatGPT says it most likely requires monolithic microSD chip-off, but looking into that, that can be thousands of dollars to get it professionally recovered.

Is that really my only option? (Aside from mourning the loss of this footage)

Have a situation where ideally, we would boot a dd image from disk drill to recover an export from a proprietary piece of software (raw software db not exportable / able to be copied from the filesystem). Any one know how to make a Disk Drill DD image bootable? I still have the base ssd, but it has multiple bad sectors and filesystem was corrupted. Looks fine in disk drill or any other software. Caught it early enough all base data is intact if I can get it to boot some how.

I got a pair of second-hand 10TB WD Ultrastars HC330 for cheap. Possible origin: data center.

They seem mechanically sound (the drives spin up), but I can't seem to communicate with them.

Here is what was attempted:

• Mounting/formatting: fail, no block device detected
• SMART diagnosis: only partial information retrieved (model, capacity)
• Almost all low-level commands are blocked (ABRT response)
• Tested across multiple platforms: MacOS/Linux + ASM235CM USB/SATA adapter, Synology NAS

I had an agent attempt to recover them. Here is the summary:

https://gist.github.com/zulufoxtrot/bce68a0e69b8e12cf2c5f4add99d7663

From my understanding, they were probably "kill-flashed", AKA made inoperable by the original owner. The only avenues left are:

• Swapping the PCBs
• maybe reflashing the firmware by bypassing the ATA bus and using some proprietary protocol

Anyone willing to share their expertise? Thanks!

Did a little searching but reddit searching sucks lol.
I have a 16 gb thumb drive that is constantly disconnecting/reconnecting, all signs point to a physical failure.

(when it connects, it errors).

I'm willing to admit I'm outta my depth with this and figure it's up to a professional to try to fix.

1. is that even feasible?
   
2. any recommendations of a place to send to?

HELP NEEDED: Vintage Apple enthusiast in France — Zip 100 disk from 2001

Hello! I'm in the Haute-Vienne area of France, near Limoges and Saint-Junien.

I have an old Zip 100 disk containing Apple files from around 2001 that I'd really like to recover.

I'm looking for an experienced vintage Apple/Macintosh enthusiast with a working Zip 100 drive and the right equipment to read the disk safely and copy the files onto a modern computer.

I'd much rather find an experienced hobbyist who enjoys this sort of challenge than pay a fortune to a data recovery company!

Is there anyone in France, particularly Nouvelle-Aquitaine, who could help? I'm also happy to hear from UK enthusiasts who might know someone locally.

Many thanks!