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07-04-2020 04:28 AM
HI There
I have this HP Pavillion 15-n096sa notebook PC, product number- F4T58EA#ABU. It fell flat on the floor from my work desk and then when I turned on. I am getting "Boot Device not Found, Please install an operating system on your hard disk. Hard disk (3F0) error" message. I tried performing F2 diagnostics checks for hard disk but I get message as " SMART CHECK : NOT INSTALLED, LONG DST: NOT INSTALLED".
I am worried about loosing the data I have on my hard drive. Can you please help me with how do I get my notebook up and running.
Many thanks
Jeet21
07-04-2020 03:43 PM
First of all, you are NOT going to be able to get the laptop up and running because the fall critically damaged the hard drive. You would need to replace the drive to put the laptop back into use.
Second, with a physically damaged drive, ANY data recovery is unlikely, but you can read through the material below if you want to try to recover files and folders ...
Your best bet for recovering data now is to do the following:
1) Remove the disk drive from the old PC. If this is a SATA hard drive or a SATA SSD, this is a simple thing to do. If this is an m.2 SSD, that could be either screwed to the motherboard or soldered to the motherboard. If the second, you would need to have a techician remove it for you, or you risk seriously damaging the PC doing it yourself.
2) If you have a desktop PC with a spare hard drive connector, then connect the old drive to that. If the old drive is a SATA drive, connect both the power cable and the data cable. If the old drive is an m.2 SSD, you will need an extra adapter to connect the SSD to a SATA-to-USB adapter. This second adapter is illustrated below)
3) Try to retrieve the files and folders you want to save from the old drive and copy them to the new PC.
If this does not work, then you need to do the following:
1) Download and install this utility on a working PC http://www.majorgeeks.com/news/story/recover_data_in_3_steps_with_minitool_power_data_recovery_free_...
2) Run the data recovery utility to see what can be retrieved from the old drive.
If that tool does not find what you need, an alternative is Recuva http://www.piriform.com/recuva
And, if that does not work well, the best tool out there is this one, but only the trial version is free http://www.file-recovery.com/
I am a volunteer and I do not work for, nor represent, HP