Is it possible to retreive video from a GE SymSafe hardrive?

[chuckaby 0]

All,

I've got a GE SymSafe Pro 16-CH DVR, which has (2) 320GB SATA Seagate hard drives. The main drive has failed as the drive won't spin up. Would it be possible to access the video footage on the 2nd drive? When I connected the 2nd hard drive to my PC, the drive showed up as 'unallocated' under Disk Management (using Windows XP). Therefore, I wasn't able to access any of the data on it.

 

Is there a workaround to get the video data off the good hard drive and is there any special software that I would need to use in order to retrieve it?

 

Thanks,

Chad

[Dirk_D 0]

Not easily.

 

Are the disks part of a raid array (hopefully raid1)?

 

Are they the same model?

 

If they're the same model you might be able to swap the control board from the one that reads 'unallocated' to the one that won't spin up.

 

Another utility you might try can be found on the 'hiren boot cd'

 

The board swap, if possible (same model), will be easiest.

 

HTH

[Bean00 0]

Well, this is an embedded DVR - the unit shouldnt need the failed HDD. The OS isn't on the drive.

 

Remove the bad HDD and try to boot. Should still work I think... if not call GE tech support. They might have a way to do it.

 

DO NOT remove and then attempt to reinstall the HDD. From what I recall these DVRs will automatically reformat the HDD when you put it back in.

 

Dirk_D there is no raid option on the GE SymSafe DVRs.

[Bean00 0]

Sorry, just realized you already removed the "good" drive.

 

I can't help you then. Sorry.