Ahh, the sweet taste of disaster.

d:raf 7:06 AM - 30 June, 2006

So I'm setting up at the art gallery to play my usual downtempo set. I turn my back and hear the heart-stopping sound of a plastic case hitting a hardwood floor. The girl who was performing before me (a singer/songwriter; not a DJ) was yanking cables up haphazardly with brute force; apparently one of them had gotten entangled with my power cord running to my external hard drive and it had taken a 3 1/2 foot plunge off the table as a result. She replies: "oops... hee hee... I'm sorry. Things like that happen when I'm around technology."

Knowing that she wasn't -trying- to destroy my shit, I sucessfully supressed the urge to grab her by the neck & squeeze. I opened the directory to the hard drive on my laptop and went a few folders deep into the directory tree. So far so good.

I started playing. The first few songs went off without a hitch. Then suddenly I loaded one and nothing showed up except my markers and loop areas (no waveform). Shortly afterwards, Serato crashed. I switched to my backup CDs (I learned my lesson when I forgot my USB cable the first time), threw on an 8 minute song and tried to load Serato up again. I loaded the same tune, it crashed again. While doing my best to keep the music going, I restarted the computer (still in denial) and started loading a few different tunes as a test before I went back to the one that crashed it; I knew it worked the day before because I had just set the loop points. The first two songs loaded fine... the third crashed Serato in the same fashion. So I quit & ran the disk utility (in retrospect, I should have done this first). It got halfway through the catalog check and gave me a fatal error.

I fear my poor HD is dead; I'm going to try the freezer trick later when I get a replacement to pull all the important shit onto. I mirrored it at an offsite location, so recovery of the tunes shouldn't be that big of a deal if nothing got deleted, but worst case scenario I have to re-encode everything again manually.

So yeah... back up your shit 'cause shit happens.

Anybody have any hard drive recovery tricks beyond the freezer technique that they'd like to share? I'd like to salvage all those loops and cue points... :(

DJ GaFFle 7:17 AM - 30 June, 2006

...I feel for you.

Yep, I've got a nice backup too. I'm gonna leave my backup-of-my-backup drive at my mom's crib or something just in case of some unforeseen scenario.

jizzer 10:24 AM - 30 June, 2006

I would have taken her equipment, smashed it, and said 'yeah that's what happens when I'm around dumb b*tches.' I hope you make her pay for that. Pulling cords after a show isn't exactly an accident is it? Geesh.

JayB1200 11:13 AM - 30 June, 2006

Quote:

I would have taken her equipment, smashed it, and said 'yeah that's what happens when I'm around dumb b*tches.' I hope you make her pay for that. Pulling cords after a show isn't exactly an accident is it? Geesh.

thats what im talking about right there!!!
she would'nt be pulling no more cables after that

DJMark 11:43 AM - 30 June, 2006

I would seriously try to get her to pay for the drive replacement, if you can't finagle one under warranty. She needs a lesson about technology, there is *no* excuse for her carelessness.

mister iLL 12:27 PM - 30 June, 2006

the bright side: it was your ext. hd and not your laptop....

sorry man

grrillatactics 1:41 PM - 30 June, 2006

Damn Raf, that sucks. I hope you can recover that data.

I hope you can talk that girl into at least replacing your HD, as even though it was an *accident* (due to her total carelessness), it is still 100% her fault.

Hektor Ruiez 3:56 PM - 30 June, 2006

poke her eyes out man.

Izzy 4:10 PM - 30 June, 2006

Sorry to hear that d:raf ...I know how much time & energy we all put into perfecting our music library. After hearing stories like this I'm seriously considering wrapping my shit in bubble wrap. Good luck, hope you can track her down.

Idlemind1999 5:37 PM - 30 June, 2006

They have these "new" Tuff drives.. at the apple store has them.. they clam to be able to take a fall from a decent height (while not running) butthey said no height was acceptable while running.

I dropped my heavy ass 500G Lacie backup drive and its totally busted... (it was in the middle of a big mix meister BPM job) and I lost everything.. luckily it was a backup drive and I have all the tunes backed up 2 more times... so Yeah.. BACK UP often..

Dj KaGeN 6:11 PM - 30 June, 2006

these stories make me sick, and that is why I still lug 1 bag of vinyl as a backup.

You should have asked for her cell phone and dropped it in a drink -oops... "paybacks, are a bitch"

punosion 6:20 PM - 30 June, 2006

Damn, dude! Sorry to hear about that.

anewsome 9:00 PM - 30 June, 2006

And people call me crazy for lugging around backup laptops and hard drives.

nik39 9:21 PM - 30 June, 2006

:(

Lucky you have a backup, just a taste of disaster.

mightyjunebugg 10:07 PM - 30 June, 2006

I would not have resisted the irge to snap her neck...you have amazing self control!!!

Dj KaGeN 10:19 PM - 30 June, 2006

she probably pulled that 'poor me' and was half way cute and knew she could get away with it... It took him a while to find out that it was actaully mucked - and she had long since bolted!

soon-2-be-ex-FS2user 10:55 PM - 30 June, 2006

so is this a bad news to get a Sertao Live Sracth

jizzer 11:17 PM - 30 June, 2006

Quote:

so is this a bad news to get a Sertao Live Sracth

I love this guy. Whos with me?

Julls 11:18 PM - 30 June, 2006

Quote:

so is this a bad news to get a Sertao Live Sracth

scratchlive.net

Dj KaGeN 11:22 PM - 30 June, 2006

That guy is just like that poodle that shits on your lawn everday. Probably a nice dog, but you still want to kicks it azz.

Julls 11:27 PM - 30 June, 2006

I couldn't have said it better KaGen!

DJLorrence 11:43 PM - 30 June, 2006

lol

d:raf 12:17 AM - 1 July, 2006

Wow, thanks for the condolences, support & what-not. Yeah, by the time I knew it was ruined, she was long gone. I called the guy who runs the night to see if he could put me in touch with her (since he booked her, I'm hoping he has her contact info) but I'm not holding my breath. My warranty expired in 2004, so no recourse there. At least I can salvage the case.

In the meantime, if anybody wants to donate to the "Help Raf buy a new hard drive fund", my paypal address is techstepper@charter.net ;).

...and I like the bubble wrap idea :). Maybe even take it a step further and design something like the schoolkids do when they have the "egg drop" competition...

Idlemind1999 12:38 PM - 1 July, 2006

I dont want to be first... but I won't the the last... :O

Does SSL run good on your 867? I was gonna give mine to my GF.. but if I use it as a dedicated SSL and it runs good, shes outta luck

DJ Irv 3:23 PM - 1 July, 2006

Make her technology challanged ass buy you a new Hard Drive.

d:raf 3:39 PM - 1 July, 2006

Quote:

Does SSL run good on your 867?

Yup. No complaints at all. I set the USB buffer at 10, left the audio cache at 15 & the screen updates at 60 and I haven't had a problem.

Djheat1200 1:41 AM - 4 March, 2007

same shit happened to me this thursday but there is no bitch to blame but a vibrating panel in the club...IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SET...anybody have any input on how i can save this hd! i went and bought a new one today knowing im going to need it...what is the best method of attempting to recover this HD, and no i dont have it backed up anywhere else!!! thanks in advance guys, im feeling pretty fucked at the moment!

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