It's been more than two weeks since the last blog, where the old PC packed it in and refused to work anymore.
If I can equate it to anything, it feels a bit like your house burned to the ground. Like coming home to find out what was once safe and in tact yesterday, now resembles a pile of indistinguishable ashes. The sanctuary of your lifetime memories gone forever.
In the fallout, there's no shortage of well intentioned loved ones around to give you a proverbial comforting pat on the shoulder. Despite their messages of support, the reality is that once you find the strength to re-build from scratch, you simply can't replace everything. The enormity of that fact, can be hugely upsetting.
At first I questioned whether the range of emotions I was feeling were justified, or completely over the top. It turns out via the multiple correspondence and sympathies I've received that I am far from alone in my loss. Data loss in a modern world, is an all too frequent and shattering occurrence.
With this fresh in your mind, it is with great pleasure that I announce the following update : With the assistance of strangers, and the generosity of friends pulling favours from colleagues, I have recovered 100% of my lost data !
While I am not a complete lamen when it comes to the inner workings of a PC, it is fair to say that I am an apprentice IT novice. The stars aligned for me, the skills of various folks came to the fore, and with MacGuyver like initiative a forensic level IT miracle was indeed performed. I'll try to paint as accurate picture as I can.
9th November - PC suddenly stops working. It turns on, but wont 'beep' at the start or boot up. Trapped in it are 44hrs of music, 2000+ photos, ALL of my band videos, ALL of my "No Pants Train Ride" archives. It is later revealed a power surge had crippled my array of power cords and outlets from the wall, on a day with room temps above 30C.
I immediately begin reaching out to online communities for ideas to try. The consensus is that while I may not be able to access it, the data 'should' be safe, and easy to get to once we fix the problem.
11th-19th November - PC tower is delivered to a family friend proficient in building PC's and installing hardware. My old hard-drive was extracted and re-seated inside a completely different tower. Several hours and tricks are employed to retrieve data from the hard drive, with absolutely NO success. Nothing can be read. A few short messages are passed on and the outlook looks grimmer than we first thought.
At this point, the crushing reality of it all breaks my spirit and I start considering 'rebuilding' from scratch. I could easily spend 5 years and only get back 50-70% back of what I'd lost. I hate computers. I hate the internet. An inner struggle begins. If I give up and don't rebuild, I lose "me". I have to fight back and rebuild or risk killing off my artistic spirit for good.
The friend offers to pass on my hard-drive to other friends for further examination. It is delivered to an address I am unaware of, and in to the hands of someone I have never met. I am comforted with 3rd hand info passed down from my very non-technically proficient wife such as " .... apparently he takes xBox's and shaved the chips so they do more stuff", which when translated loosely means this colleague has more skills and means at his disposal to try and retrieve something from hard-drive.
20th-25th November - By now, I am in some sort of post-apocalyptic recovery mindset. I've re-told my story to a few people and began reaching out for help to rebuild the music collection. In my world, we have 70% of our photos backed up on CDRW discs. I can get about 50% of my music from friends. But other stuff is largely lost. I'm resigned to the fact it will never be the same as it was.
During this period two messages arrive for me, delivered by my wife, from our friend ....
#1 = "It looks like we can get some of your data.".
A day or two later comes the next one ...
#2 = "All of your data is safe. When can I come to your house ?"
26th November - All data is saved ... AND BACKED-UP !!!!
So .... here we are. As I type I have everything safely stored on our shiny new 2TB external drive. And I find myself strangely numb all over again. Life experience has taught me this is in fact a mild form of Post Traumatic Stress. Other folks simply refer to it as being a 'stunned mullet'. It thoroughly astounds me, what has happened !!!
The technical details of what occurred are like so. - My hard-drive arrived to the 3rd persons house, and I'm told he noted something was rattling inside it that "doesn't sound normal". His efforts to have it function meant that my hard-drive was placed inside an anti-static bag, then placed inside a freezer bag, and left overnight for 24hrs in either the fridge or freezer. It emerged the next day, and worked for only 45mins before failing completely due to mechanical issues. During the 45min window, a "snapshot" of my hard-drive was secured, and from it ALL of the data extracted and saved. - Just like THAT !!!
Like I said earlier, I'm a self confessed IT noob, but I'm not completely useless. I recognise that what occured was akin to forensic level data recovery. The same kind used by Police and Govt agencies to get to those deleted files you think have gone from your PC but are in fact still there.
It's not often I'm lost for words ... but it must be said I'm grateful beyond what any meandering nonsense I write could ever describe.
With that in mind I'd like to publicly thank the following people ....
* Bernie Glynn : For his generosity, his time, efforts, skills and contacts. Truly blessed to have this man in the life of my family.
* Bernie's mystery colleague/friend : For the love of God, the gents name escapes me ... but I have a fair hunch he'll wind up reading this regardless. To you sir, I cannot thank you enough. Your skills have resurrected a lifetime of memories from the proverbial ashes of despair.
* Mitch and Nick : Couple of great lads (and/or complete shit-stirrers depending on who your support in sport) from the online Bulldogs family, who were kind enough to lend an online ear to my delirious rants and guide me down more constructive paths.
* Mrs Kickass : My long suffering wife who tolerates my many deficiencies and sees far too much of the worst of me, but STILL hangs around to shower me with love and support.
If I can equate it to anything, it feels a bit like your house burned to the ground. Like coming home to find out what was once safe and in tact yesterday, now resembles a pile of indistinguishable ashes. The sanctuary of your lifetime memories gone forever.
In the fallout, there's no shortage of well intentioned loved ones around to give you a proverbial comforting pat on the shoulder. Despite their messages of support, the reality is that once you find the strength to re-build from scratch, you simply can't replace everything. The enormity of that fact, can be hugely upsetting.
At first I questioned whether the range of emotions I was feeling were justified, or completely over the top. It turns out via the multiple correspondence and sympathies I've received that I am far from alone in my loss. Data loss in a modern world, is an all too frequent and shattering occurrence.
With this fresh in your mind, it is with great pleasure that I announce the following update : With the assistance of strangers, and the generosity of friends pulling favours from colleagues, I have recovered 100% of my lost data !
While I am not a complete lamen when it comes to the inner workings of a PC, it is fair to say that I am an apprentice IT novice. The stars aligned for me, the skills of various folks came to the fore, and with MacGuyver like initiative a forensic level IT miracle was indeed performed. I'll try to paint as accurate picture as I can.
9th November - PC suddenly stops working. It turns on, but wont 'beep' at the start or boot up. Trapped in it are 44hrs of music, 2000+ photos, ALL of my band videos, ALL of my "No Pants Train Ride" archives. It is later revealed a power surge had crippled my array of power cords and outlets from the wall, on a day with room temps above 30C.
I immediately begin reaching out to online communities for ideas to try. The consensus is that while I may not be able to access it, the data 'should' be safe, and easy to get to once we fix the problem.
11th-19th November - PC tower is delivered to a family friend proficient in building PC's and installing hardware. My old hard-drive was extracted and re-seated inside a completely different tower. Several hours and tricks are employed to retrieve data from the hard drive, with absolutely NO success. Nothing can be read. A few short messages are passed on and the outlook looks grimmer than we first thought.
At this point, the crushing reality of it all breaks my spirit and I start considering 'rebuilding' from scratch. I could easily spend 5 years and only get back 50-70% back of what I'd lost. I hate computers. I hate the internet. An inner struggle begins. If I give up and don't rebuild, I lose "me". I have to fight back and rebuild or risk killing off my artistic spirit for good.
The friend offers to pass on my hard-drive to other friends for further examination. It is delivered to an address I am unaware of, and in to the hands of someone I have never met. I am comforted with 3rd hand info passed down from my very non-technically proficient wife such as " .... apparently he takes xBox's and shaved the chips so they do more stuff", which when translated loosely means this colleague has more skills and means at his disposal to try and retrieve something from hard-drive.
20th-25th November - By now, I am in some sort of post-apocalyptic recovery mindset. I've re-told my story to a few people and began reaching out for help to rebuild the music collection. In my world, we have 70% of our photos backed up on CDRW discs. I can get about 50% of my music from friends. But other stuff is largely lost. I'm resigned to the fact it will never be the same as it was.
During this period two messages arrive for me, delivered by my wife, from our friend ....
#1 = "It looks like we can get some of your data.".
A day or two later comes the next one ...
#2 = "All of your data is safe. When can I come to your house ?"
26th November - All data is saved ... AND BACKED-UP !!!!
So .... here we are. As I type I have everything safely stored on our shiny new 2TB external drive. And I find myself strangely numb all over again. Life experience has taught me this is in fact a mild form of Post Traumatic Stress. Other folks simply refer to it as being a 'stunned mullet'. It thoroughly astounds me, what has happened !!!
The technical details of what occurred are like so. - My hard-drive arrived to the 3rd persons house, and I'm told he noted something was rattling inside it that "doesn't sound normal". His efforts to have it function meant that my hard-drive was placed inside an anti-static bag, then placed inside a freezer bag, and left overnight for 24hrs in either the fridge or freezer. It emerged the next day, and worked for only 45mins before failing completely due to mechanical issues. During the 45min window, a "snapshot" of my hard-drive was secured, and from it ALL of the data extracted and saved. - Just like THAT !!!
Like I said earlier, I'm a self confessed IT noob, but I'm not completely useless. I recognise that what occured was akin to forensic level data recovery. The same kind used by Police and Govt agencies to get to those deleted files you think have gone from your PC but are in fact still there.
It's not often I'm lost for words ... but it must be said I'm grateful beyond what any meandering nonsense I write could ever describe.
With that in mind I'd like to publicly thank the following people ....
* Bernie Glynn : For his generosity, his time, efforts, skills and contacts. Truly blessed to have this man in the life of my family.
* Bernie's mystery colleague/friend : For the love of God, the gents name escapes me ... but I have a fair hunch he'll wind up reading this regardless. To you sir, I cannot thank you enough. Your skills have resurrected a lifetime of memories from the proverbial ashes of despair.
* Mitch and Nick : Couple of great lads (and/or complete shit-stirrers depending on who your support in sport) from the online Bulldogs family, who were kind enough to lend an online ear to my delirious rants and guide me down more constructive paths.
* Mrs Kickass : My long suffering wife who tolerates my many deficiencies and sees far too much of the worst of me, but STILL hangs around to shower me with love and support.