External Hard Drive Broke - How bad is it??

[DRUK88]

Hi,

A few months ago I bought an External Hard Drive (1tb). The C Drive on my laptop was getting full and I could free space by putting all my documents and also my Database on the external. However, as of last night it is completely broke and I need to get it replaced.

I'm not entirely sure whether all is lost, but because I'm a bit of a noob with databases I need some help.

I have HEM installed on my laptop.
I have HMArchive on my laptop (and there is content - 2012 -> 04 to 07 -> each folder has random numbered files -> folders have HH.txt files)
I have PostgreSQL on my laptop EXCEPT for "data" folder (C/Program Files/PostgreSQL/8.4/data). This folder is empty except a notepad file explaining that this folder is located on the external HDD.

If you need more information, please ask.

I am hoping that I can just replace the external HDD and reimport the HMArchive files or something? If not I can pay for the data to be retrieved from the broken HDD, I just don't know if this is necessary as it isn't cheap.

Thanks in advance - again if anything is confusing or need more information, feel free.

[Patvs]

Did you play poker before april 2012?
The archive folder on your C:/ laptop has all the original handhistories from april to july 2012.
So if those are ALL your hands, you can just import them into a new database, (and not worry about the lost PostgreSQL /DATA folder)

Also if you played on PokerStars, you can email their support and request the handhistories for EVERY hand you've ever played.

What you will lose, by losing access to the /DATA folder, is your NOTES: if you used HoldemManager for notes: those were stored in the database.

[DRUK88]

Did you play poker before april 2012?
The archive folder on your C:/ laptop has all the original handhistories from april to july 2012.
So if those are ALL your hands, you can just import them into a new database, (and not worry about the lost PostgreSQL /DATA folder)

Also if you played on PokerStars, you can email their support and request the handhistories for EVERY hand you've ever played.

What you will lose, by losing access to the /DATA folder, is your NOTES: if you used HoldemManager for notes: those were stored in the database.

Yes I did play poker before April 2012, but I have only played on the site I'm playing on now since around April 2012 so that should be fine. I deleted FTP data which is where I used to play, but there is time from FTP to April where I played on a diff site but the files aren't there. I'm not gonna be playing there again though so I guess it doesn't really matter.

Losing notes will be a bit annoying but not a huge deal. If I got the stats that's what's important.

So (provided I don't get the stuff retrieved from my broken external HD), I could redownload HEM, import from the folders in HMArchive and only have lost my notes?

[Patvs]

Yes.

If you can retrieve data from the broken HD.
Copy the PostgreSQL /Data folder to a non-broken drive.
Reinstall PostgreSQL, during the installation (installer from PostgreSQL: The world's most advanced open source database) select the location of the old /DATA folder.... and with some *luck* it can connect to the old database.