I've had a damaged Samsung HM500JJ Rev. A laptop drive lying around for some time but only recently tried to recover any data from it. It died just after a year of use, out of the blue: no indications from SMART data, or IO slowdowns, or anything else. Just some horrible grinding sounds, which as soon as they started, I forced the computer off.
Now, some years later...
The drive powers on, hums smoothly, and is recognized by the kernel. However, I can't read any data whatsoever from it:
gsmartcontrol
unknown device, unable to read data
ddrescue, direct access mode
0 bytes recovered.
The drive hums smoothly throughout the entire process. About halfway through, a faint scratching sound started, so I pulled the plug. Meanwhile, in kernel land:
kernel (from ddrescue)
sd 6:0:0:0: [sdc] CDB: Read(10): 28 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08 00 Buffer I/O error on dev sdc, logical block 0, async page read
gparted
fsync error on close
(approximately) No partitions are recognized.
First, any recovery tips? Such as, try shaking the drive as though it were a broken TV, stick it in the freezer (or try recovery from a cold environment), or perhaps use some specialized software?
Mainly, I'm surprised by how quickly it failed and that now it runs smoothly. Is it possible the drive is OK, and the circuitry failed? I could try replacing the board below the drive?