Main Question: Have I lost all my data forever?
Mac Book Pro Mid-2010
Condition: Only had 5GB of 320GB left of space (I have been trying to clear and back it up over the last year!).
Battery has been at "Critical Condition Replace Soon" for about 15 months.
I installed OS Sierra last night. The first time turning it back on since then brought my desktop to the screen but whenever I tried to open an app it would just go black and not do anything except show the mouse so I hard shut down the laptop.
When it turned on again all that came up was a flashing folder with a question mark in it.
I followed the instructions from this page https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT204323 which say to turn it back on holding down Cmd-R. No start up disk appeared after Disk Utility Repair which this page says indicates a hardware problem.
I am not that concerned about the laptop, more the data on the hard drive (Photos in particular). Does the prognosis below sound about right?
Called the apple accredited repair shop in my area (in London). First he said Apple wouldn't help because they don't deal with data and since the laptop is from 2010 parts are no longer made so my laptop cannot be repaired.
About the data: he said it sounds like a hardware failure and they may not be able to recover the data, they will do an investigation to see if they can - if so it will be about 4 hours work at £65/hour - £260 in total.
Mac Book Pro Mid-2010
Condition: Only had 5GB of 320GB left of space (I have been trying to clear and back it up over the last year!).
Battery has been at "Critical Condition Replace Soon" for about 15 months.
I installed OS Sierra last night. The first time turning it back on since then brought my desktop to the screen but whenever I tried to open an app it would just go black and not do anything except show the mouse so I hard shut down the laptop.
When it turned on again all that came up was a flashing folder with a question mark in it.
I followed the instructions from this page https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT204323 which say to turn it back on holding down Cmd-R. No start up disk appeared after Disk Utility Repair which this page says indicates a hardware problem.
I am not that concerned about the laptop, more the data on the hard drive (Photos in particular). Does the prognosis below sound about right?
Called the apple accredited repair shop in my area (in London). First he said Apple wouldn't help because they don't deal with data and since the laptop is from 2010 parts are no longer made so my laptop cannot be repaired.
About the data: he said it sounds like a hardware failure and they may not be able to recover the data, they will do an investigation to see if they can - if so it will be about 4 hours work at £65/hour - £260 in total.
