05 January 2007
1 TB Drive Announced by Seagate
Seagate has announced its plans to release a 1TB hard drive sometime in the first half of 2007. The 3.5 inch drive will be made possible by the use of perpendicular recording rather than the previous standard of longitudinal recording. Along with this, Seagate brags that their drive will have use fewer heads and discs which reduces the operating temperature of the drive along with weight, power consumption and noise. Also gained is a higher level of reliability.
Labels: harddrive
31 December 2006
Windows Partition Management Without Data Loss
There is an interesting product for those who need to manage their hard drive without losing data. Partition Manager from Paragon Software Group offers just that and more features.
This software allows users to resize, move, hide, merge, restore and convert partitions without loss of their data. Along with this the software allows for drive defragmentation and data recovery from deleted partitions and crash recovery with a bootable CD. For the full features with descriptions look at their feature page.
The enterprise server edition of course has more features including advanced backup features and the ability to resize hard drive partitions without interrupting the normal operations of the computer. Again the feature page has a complete list of options and descriptions.
While I don't recommend such software for everyone, it can be useful for people managing Windows-based computer systems especially when data loss is not an option.
This software allows users to resize, move, hide, merge, restore and convert partitions without loss of their data. Along with this the software allows for drive defragmentation and data recovery from deleted partitions and crash recovery with a bootable CD. For the full features with descriptions look at their feature page.
The enterprise server edition of course has more features including advanced backup features and the ability to resize hard drive partitions without interrupting the normal operations of the computer. Again the feature page has a complete list of options and descriptions.
While I don't recommend such software for everyone, it can be useful for people managing Windows-based computer systems especially when data loss is not an option.
Labels: harddrive, management, partition, windows
29 November 2006
Read data off of a dead hard drive?
Sooner or later we all encounter a crashed or bad hard drive, for those who have had a Compaq, especially during the early 90's, it may have been sooner than later. The problem in such situations is how to get the data off of the drive. The trick of freezing the drive has been mentioned several times as a way to make the drive readable in order to get data off of it, but the problem is how do you get the information off?
For Linux users, dd_rescue is an option. It will read the drive and when it encounters an error will skip to the next sector hopefully bypassing the error and getting more data. Later it is possible to read those failed sectors backwards to try to get more data from them and to use smaller block sizes, which will isolate the problem in an even smaller area. There may still be some missing data after all of this, but you will have most of it in one large file. This file can later be mounted and read onto another drive to get at least most of the data back and on another drive.
There is a very nice article describing how to use the utility as well as giving options on where to find it.
For Linux users, dd_rescue is an option. It will read the drive and when it encounters an error will skip to the next sector hopefully bypassing the error and getting more data. Later it is possible to read those failed sectors backwards to try to get more data from them and to use smaller block sizes, which will isolate the problem in an even smaller area. There may still be some missing data after all of this, but you will have most of it in one large file. This file can later be mounted and read onto another drive to get at least most of the data back and on another drive.
There is a very nice article describing how to use the utility as well as giving options on where to find it.
Labels: harddrive, linux, recover
15 September 2006
Free file space in Gmail
Want extra file space on your computer? For Linux users Gmail can be an extra few gigs for files.
GmailFS is a Python based application that in connection with FUSE provides the ability to communicate with Gmail using standard Unix/Linux commands to manipulate and store files.
Anything can be stored with this system, but because there is a possibility that is is unreliable, it's advisable to keep important files on your system and store easily replaced files on the GmailFS.
For information on how this is done, you can buy the O'Reilly book 'Google Hacks' or you can read an excerpt from that book here.
GmailFS is a Python based application that in connection with FUSE provides the ability to communicate with Gmail using standard Unix/Linux commands to manipulate and store files.
Anything can be stored with this system, but because there is a possibility that is is unreliable, it's advisable to keep important files on your system and store easily replaced files on the GmailFS.
For information on how this is done, you can buy the O'Reilly book 'Google Hacks' or you can read an excerpt from that book here.
Labels: gmail, Google, harddrive, linux
28 August 2006
Drive Cleanup Utility
Looking for a way to see which files are taking the most space on your hard drive and removing them? WinDirStat and KDirStat are two programs for doing just that. WinDirStat is of course for Windows while KDirStat is the Linux version, which comes as part of KDE.
This program displays a tree structure of the drive and as well show a graphical representation of the files. A person can click on the graphic showing a large portion of the drive and see exactly what that file is. Also when a folder is selected in the tree view it highlights the area of the graphic that corresponds to that folder. This utility is designed to help a user clean their system, so from this display files are able to be deleted as well as viewed.
If you're looking for a fast way to see which files are taking most of your space to help you decide which to remove from your drive, this is a perfect application for you.
This program displays a tree structure of the drive and as well show a graphical representation of the files. A person can click on the graphic showing a large portion of the drive and see exactly what that file is. Also when a folder is selected in the tree view it highlights the area of the graphic that corresponds to that folder. This utility is designed to help a user clean their system, so from this display files are able to be deleted as well as viewed.
If you're looking for a fast way to see which files are taking most of your space to help you decide which to remove from your drive, this is a perfect application for you.
Labels: harddrive, linux, OSS, windows
19 August 2006
Why you don't have to defragment Linux
There is a very good explanation on why Linux does not need defragmentation. It is straightforward and easy to understand and uses simple diagrams for anyone to understand even those with not so much computer knowledge.
You can find the information on:
OneAndOneIs2
You can find the information on:
OneAndOneIs218 August 2006
Copy a hard drive without spending a fortune for tools
Looking to backup or clone a hard drive without spending the money for programs such as Norton Ghost?
There are some free tools for doing such actions that are worth looking into. DriveImage XML is one such tool. It allows you to backup a hard disk while it is still in use eliminating the need to choose a time when you are sure that the drive is not being used or taking the drive offline while backing it up. It also allows for the drive to be restored without a reboot, speeding the process considerably.
HD Clone is another tool with the only limitation being the transfer speed while copying data. It is also primarily for copying data from one hard drive to another of the same size or larger. It is very useful for people upgrading their hard drive and don't want to lose any of the data.
Ranish Partition Manager is a tool that works with Linux, Windows, FreeDOS and FreeBSD allowing people to create, copy, and resize the partitions on their hard drive. It works from a command line interface and a simulation mode that allows users to experiment before they actually change their drive's partition tables.
There are some free tools for doing such actions that are worth looking into. DriveImage XML is one such tool. It allows you to backup a hard disk while it is still in use eliminating the need to choose a time when you are sure that the drive is not being used or taking the drive offline while backing it up. It also allows for the drive to be restored without a reboot, speeding the process considerably.
HD Clone is another tool with the only limitation being the transfer speed while copying data. It is also primarily for copying data from one hard drive to another of the same size or larger. It is very useful for people upgrading their hard drive and don't want to lose any of the data.
Ranish Partition Manager is a tool that works with Linux, Windows, FreeDOS and FreeBSD allowing people to create, copy, and resize the partitions on their hard drive. It works from a command line interface and a simulation mode that allows users to experiment before they actually change their drive's partition tables.
Labels: backup, harddrive, restore
15 August 2006
1 Terrabyte hard drives expected this year
Later this year the 1 TB (terabyte) hard drive will probably be a reality.
I would ask what a person would need that much storage space for, but not that long ago I was thinking I would have difficulty in filling a 10 GB hard drive. That was full in less than two years. Currently with the creation of High Definition video, we have one way of filling such a drive.
Retail prices for hard drives are about 50 cents per GB of storage space so a TB drive should debut at around $500 unless the technology becomes cheaper to make.
This year is also marking the 50th birthday of the hard drive on September 13. In 50 years the hard drives have gone from a 24 inch wide monster weighing in at a ton to something that will fit in your hand and holds several GB's
I would ask what a person would need that much storage space for, but not that long ago I was thinking I would have difficulty in filling a 10 GB hard drive. That was full in less than two years. Currently with the creation of High Definition video, we have one way of filling such a drive.
Retail prices for hard drives are about 50 cents per GB of storage space so a TB drive should debut at around $500 unless the technology becomes cheaper to make.
This year is also marking the 50th birthday of the hard drive on September 13. In 50 years the hard drives have gone from a 24 inch wide monster weighing in at a ton to something that will fit in your hand and holds several GB's
Labels: harddrive
