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Comment by MWil | Hacker News Reader

I wish this could help me recover 3 btc I had in 2010 b/c I still have the HDD. My problem is that my disk is extra dead - it stopped spinning completely. I can't use hiren's boot tools with it like I could my other dead drives. I've heard I would have to bring it into a clean room environment for about a grand and have experts recreate the drive.

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I've heard success stories of transplanting platters into the same model working drive, maybe this is worth a shot?

I have also heard/read about a few people doing this.

If I remember correctly, you need a special tool to pick the platters up out of the drive without rotating them, but aside from that just a new controller/assy.

Thanks, I hadn't really heard about this. Although at current btc prices, it might actually just be cheaper for me to claim them as "lost" on my taxes than try and recover them

If you're considering tossing the drive, please consider mailing it to my address instead so that I can try my hand at recovering the bitcoins. I can cover shipping costs. I'll email you in case you're interested.

I emailed you back.

Just keep the HDD in storage until btc prices reach 10-20k then send the drive in.

Well I'm not sure if moving several times and all other factors have made it exponentially harder to recover the data. It's double wrapped in a thick ziplock inside that shiny metal bag that hdd's come in when purchased out of the box and then in the freezer but of course it's been thawed and refrozen several times by now. I have no idea what the state of deterioration is or how far it'll be if they ever reach that high!

For future note, ziploc in freezer = extremely bad unless you add a desiccant to soak up stray moisture. Get som silica in there stat! Or failing that, white rice wrapped in good tissue/cloth.

oh the whole inside is silica and paper towels which are changed (probably should be more frequently)

I think it would be worth it first to just swap out the controller board on the bottom of the drive. If it isn't the motor itself, then that might fix the drive.

Freezer? I've heard of HDDs that wouldn't spin up, were put in a freezer for 2 days and then spun up. They key is to copy the data off QUICKLY as it dies the moment warms up. So you can't go around doing a "grep -r -i bitcoin /" ...

Be very careful about condensation if you do this.

That's why you use a baggie.

Yes, and a dessicant, like silica gel, to absorb moisture.

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