Laptops Laptop drive died - need help to access!

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semushlich

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My laptop drive died (I swear I will NEVER buy a Compaq again). I'm using an R-Driver USB 2.0 to IDE cable to access it with my desktop.

When I first hooked it up I could hear the clunking in the drive, now it's silent.

The drive is warm and I can feel it running, however, my computer isn't even recognising it as a USB drive.

Please help! I need my data :(
 
semushlich said:
My laptop drive died (I swear I will NEVER buy a Compaq again). I'm using an R-Driver USB 2.0 to IDE cable to access it with my desktop.

When I first hooked it up I could hear the clunking in the drive, now it's silent.

The drive is warm and I can feel it running, however, my computer isn't even recognising it as a USB drive.

Please help! I need my data :(
Click to expand...

Does it show up in XP's Disk Management ? Unless you have allocated the drive a letter it will not show up in Explorer.

Recently a friends Notebook booted up and showed no drive found error - he took it to the Notebooks repair center and they could not make the drive work so he bought a new one and I took the "dead" drive thinking I would use it as a paper weight. Just a few days back I attached it to the same R-Driver USB 2.0 to IDE cable and instantly the drive worked fine. So I now have an extra 2.5" :)
 
semushlich said:
My laptop drive died (I swear I will NEVER buy a Compaq again). I'm using an R-Driver USB 2.0 to IDE cable to access it with my desktop.

When I first hooked it up I could hear the clunking in the drive, now it's silent.

The drive is warm and I can feel it running, however, my computer isn't even recognising it as a USB drive.

Please help! I need my data :(
Click to expand...

If your drive is dead (as you have mentioned above) then how will it work on a desktop pc ...?? :( A dead drive remains a dead drive ...:huh:

anyways try to set the drive as "master" and boot xp on ur desktop "Then" connect the drive to the desktop and try....
 
anyways try to set the drive as "master" and boot xp on ur desktop "Then" connect the drive to the desktop and try....
Click to expand...

I was just curious, but I didnt understand that ? Can you set a USB drive as a master or slave, I thought its just plug and play, leaving the jumper settings to cable select.
 
Aces170, even i am perplexed by the poster's query.
here i am assuming that it is a normal ide 2.5" drive and he is using a convertor so that he can connect it via usb to his desktop pc.
 
deejay said:
Aces170, even i am perplexed by the poster's query.
here i am assuming that it is a normal ide 2.5" drive and he is using a convertor so that he can connect it via usb to his desktop pc.
Click to expand...

Like I mentioned in my post above - my friends HDD in his notebook was dead as the dodo the guys at the notebook repair centre (Toshiba I think) could not make it run and gave up but the moment I connected the drive with the very same USB to IDE cable as semushlich's the drive worked perfectly. I have now installed Win98SE on this 2.5" drive and my system boots into this version of Windows when the drive is attached to the USB port.

@semushlich
Check out this file "200 ways to revive a hard drive"
http://www.hddrecovery.com.au/downloads/200ways.pdf
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Hi Eazy,
which format drive it was .... a normal ide 2.5" drive (with that 44 pin connector)??
and i was refering to semushlich's first post above.
 
deejay said:
Hi Eazy,
which format drive it was .... a normal ide 2.5" drive (with that 44 pin connector)??
and i was refering to semushlich's first post above.
Click to expand...

YES - a normal 2.5" 44pin 4500rpm .......Toshiba 850mb.... less capacity than my Thumb drive :)

The drive refused to work on the notebook but works fine with USB2IDE cable. New drive in Notebook is working fine too.
 
semushlich, are you sure you have connected the r-driver properly ? also try connecting to different usb ports.

the r-driver must be recognized first by your system for your hard drive to show up. try another harddrive if you have one, see if that shows up as usb. first lets make sure your r-driver is fine.

@deejay - semushlich is a techie mom :)
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Thanks for all the ideas :) And yes, I'm a she ;)

When you've lost all your data (including 4 yrs worth of photos) you'll try ANYTHING to get it back. Hence my hooking up a "dead" laptop drive to see if my desktop will recognize it.

I will attempt your ideas today, and get back to you.

Thanks again for your help!
 
Eazy said:
Does it show up in XP's Disk Management ? Unless you have allocated the drive a letter it will not show up in Explorer.

Recently a friends Notebook booted up and showed no drive found error - he took it to the Notebooks repair center and they could not make the drive work so he bought a new one and I took the "dead" drive thinking I would use it as a paper weight. Just a few days back I attached it to the same R-Driver USB 2.0 to IDE cable and instantly the drive worked fine. So I now have an extra 2.5" :)
Click to expand...

Argh, this stinks! I know nothing!!! OK. The drive isn't even showing up in Disk Management, so I'm guessing I'm going to have to pay someone up the wazzoo to recover my data :(

The r-driver is working - I checked it with another hard drive which was installed and recognized in under a minute.

Oh soooooooo sad.
 
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