Slow week

[Jonty]

May seems to be slow for private customers, but we're just starting to see a nice steady increase in biz trade. Same thing every year!

 

[ohio_grad_06]

So the image got down to less than 2 hours and finally hit a bad sector. I told it to ignore all. Hoping it produces a useable image after all this time lol.

 

[Kaizen]

So the image got down to less than 2 hours and finally hit a bad sector. I told it to ignore all. Hoping it produces a useable image after all this time lol.

If you even suspect a bad drive, use ddrescue. With acronis and skipping sectors you may be leaving a large amount of data behind.

For what it's worth, I love acronis and we are still using the 2010 version on a daily basis if the drive has had a complete perfect surface scan. If the drive shows any issues, there are better choices to make an image.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Yeah I never totally learned to use dd. I probably need to look into that. Thankfully this is the first bad sectors I've seen it hit. Been considering using backupper more anyway

 

[Kaizen]

I had a broken link(fixed it) , this guide is great http://www.technibble.com/forums/showthread.php?t=48269&highlight=Ddrescue

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Hm. So I actually have this machine at my home. I want this thing to work. Acronis got to a little under 2 hours to go, hit a bad sector and just seemed to die and not really progress. Got irritated and shut it off. Looked at the guide for ddrescue you posted. Hooked the new drive up and am having dsrescue try to clone directly to the new drive. Within maybe 20-30 minutes it had already copied 80gb or so.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Clone with ddrescue finished. 1109 errors. It's doing check disk curious if it will boot.

 

[Kaizen]

If you do any data recovery in-house, always use best practices of creating a clone(or image) of the failing drive, then only do the recovery from that clone. It serves two purposes. First ddrescue uses a log to keep track of what has been recovered. Ideally you use the multiple pass method. So the first pass grabs the easy data. If the drive fails at this point, you may have what was most important. Then it runs the second pass which hits the drive hard to fill in any gaps(missing data). This will allow you to increase your chances of getting more bits. Secondly it is the most responsible way to properly handle your customers information.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Was actually doing this but was using acronis. Looks like I will be using ddrescue more though.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Just an update, thanks for posting the ddrescue guide. The computer lives!!! Muahaha! DDrescue cloned from failing drive to new drive in under 24 hours, got into startup repair, did a system restore, and voila it boots. Now just gotta clean things up

It also appears they knew that the drive was getting full, they had compressed it. Don't people know you aren't supposed to fill your drive all the way up?

 

[Kaizen]

Nice! Thanks for the update.

 

[HawkinsPC]

My slow week continues. Slow weeks, really. I had one customer Tuesday. The city has brought me a few computers, but I won't get paid for those for 30+ days. So, my last real customer was May 2nd... and she still hasn't paid yet. A local eye care place called to say they were bringing by two laptops yesterday. They were a no-show. I'm not even getting phone calls anymore.

At this point, I've decided to go appointment-only and use the storefront as more of an office. I won't have regular hours up here, so I won't force the kids to spend their summer in a glorified closet with windows. I'll try it out for a month and if it still isn't working, I'll give up the shop and move into a corner of my sister's store for pick-ups/drop-offs.

I'm still aiming to leave this town at the end of the summer and open elsewhere. It's just a weird situation. I've hated my shop lately... but I don't want to be broke.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

We actually do that. Pay a local place a little each month they accept drop offs and we pick them up when we aren't at appointments. Saves a good bit of money because you still have a presence, but you don't have double rent and double utilities. We actually do this in 2 towns so hopefully when one is down the other is up. Another way to save money, ask your cell phone company about porting your landline number to a cell phone, only a few bucks per month and you keep your old number.

 

[cypress]

It has been steady, nothing crazy at all but OKAY lol. 90% of the jobs have been virus/malware removal. Have setup a new computer in between and referred a data recovery job to 300DDR. Would like to do more break/fix though.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Well had to go talk to one of my existing clients, they'd had a pc built by someone a few years back(now out of business), which is where I come in, anyway called because smoke had been coming out the back of the pc. Open the pc, a Molex to sata connector had melted, melted part of the power connection to the hard drive, charred part of the case, charred sata cables. Suffice to say, glad there was not a house fire. The power supply was only rated for 16 amps on a single 12 volt rail. Surprisingly the motherboard survived lol. I had a spare power supply with me, the board actually posted. Recommended a rebuild in the same case as I believe then it's considered the same computer, correct? She has Windows 7 pro for it, looking to use that for her, so looking at an amd apu, 4gb of ram, 500gb drive to replace the burnt one, and a good power supply, I'm thinking evga or corsair.

 

[NYJimbo]

I'm still aiming to leave this town at the end of the summer and open elsewhere. It's just a weird situation. I've hated my shop lately... but I don't want to be broke.

I've followed your posts and even "Google Earthed" your building and town (granted they are somewhat older pics), as well as read about your area and I think that you are not going to do any better in the location you are at.

Your knowledge, your skills, your drive, your desire, your everything is being wasted or tortured at this location and I think the longer you stay at that location the more you will hate being there AND hate being in this business. You cant tell if the next location will be any better but I am certain where you are now will not ever be any better.

Only you know what you can do with your situation, but from what I have read from your posts and about your location it will NOT get better.

What you do from here is unique to your situation, but don't waste any more time there than you have to.

Good luck.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

Days like today are satisfying. Guy with the computer that had the drive I'd had so much trouble with earlier in this thread got his pc back today, was very happy about everything working and not losing any data, and says next time he has a problem he's calling us. It's nice when you the customers appreciate the work you put into their stuff.

 

[TenYardFight]

Set a record in January. Matched it in February. Matched it in March. Up 33% in April. Getting ready to hire our third person this year. No advertising, just networking.

 

[Kaizen]

Set a record in January. Matched it in February. Matched it in March. Up 33% in April. Getting ready to hire our third person this year. No advertising, just networking.

Nice!

Looking at your website, you appear to cater to more break/fix. Where is your biggest growth coming from?

 

[TenYardFight]

Web Design and development is the biggest growth. Breakfix serves as lead generation for B2B and web.

Hopefully when I am not working 70 hours per week I can update that 4 year old website.