I don't understand the present situation. If you were able to connect the
hard disk to another computer and recovered a file(s) it must have been
spinning. Are you saying that it has only now stopped spinning? If you
have retrieved all the data you want from it the best thing would be to
dispose of it (but be aware of the security implications of just dumping
it). If you have not retrieved all the data you want from it you will need
to refer it to a specialist as I suggested in a previous post.

Regards.

Bill Ridgeway
Computer Solutions

wrote in message
oups.com...
Thanks for the reply Bill,

Unfortunately, the drive isn't spinning at all now.

I really don't understand how the file I recovered (I slaved it onto
another machine and accessed it from there) had lots information
included in it

Anyway... she has learned from this experience.

On Jan 23, 3:57 pm, "Bill Ridgeway" wrote:
wrote in
oglegroups.com...

HI folks

I am hoping someone can help me out here

I recovered an excel file for a colleague from a hard drive that had
died

The problem is that one year's work has somehow disappeared

Has anyone any ideas on how to resolve this?When a file is deleted it
isn't physically deleted and when file is saved it
isn't necessarily over the original. Let me explain. The computer keeps
a
record of all the
files on the hard disk. Think of it as an index. If you were to cross
out
a line in the index of a book the word or phrase will still be extant in
the
body of the book. (The difference with a computer is that the area of
the
'lost' file is available for re-use). It is, therefore, possible to
recover
'lost' files. As you will appreciate success depends on whether or not
the
area on the hard drive has been re-used.

There are a number of software that will do the job. I have used and,
therefore, can recommend 'Get data back'www.runtime.org. It is highly
recommended that the software is installed on and run from another hard
disk
(to decrease the possibility of overwriting the 'lost' file).

All this assumes that, at least, the hard disk will spin. It is possible
to
recover data from a hard disk that doesn't spin. This is, however, a
specialist (forensic) operation and will be charged accordingly. It
wouldn't do any harm to find someone local who could do this for you and
assess and possibly justify the charge against the cost (time, patience
and
money) of re-entering the 'lost' data. Some work on the amount of data
recovered so if you're looking only for one file the charge may not
amount
to much (comparatively speaking),

You should, perhaps, also think of getting a backing up system. You may
like to have a look at my web sitewww.1001solutions.co.ukfor more
information.

Regards.

Bill Ridgeway
Computer Solutions