Hi guys

Dropped my Maxtor 1TB hard drive on the weekend, and now it won't power on. When I plug it in I can hear a kind of churning sound, but it just won't initialise. I've done this once before, just after I bought it, and at the time I was able to get it replaced by Maxtor/Seagate (after having spent considerable money unsuccessfully trying to have the data recovered on it). As I bought it from the UK, and the Maxtor website doesn't seem to be recognising any of my part numbers, I don't see it being worth the time or cost to ship it back to them, and they don't actually do any data recovery on it anyways. Would be much cheaper for me to buy a new drive.

Now, it's mostly just movies, tv shows, etc that are on there, so nothing critical. But I thought I might see if I can bring it back to life in the hope of perhaps transferring anything I can salvage over to a new drive. I've never cracked one of these puppies open before, so is there any advice on what I should be looking for/to do? Or anyone who would be willing to take a look at it for me in exchange for some beers?

Thank you kind sirs.

You need to remove the hard drive from within the casing and put it either in another such casing that you know is working, or connect it directly to your motherboard and internal PSU. If that doesn't work, then you're f***ed.

I've only got a netbook at the moment, which makes things tougher. Sounds like I am hopelessly underprepared for this...

Right, have got the actual drive out of all its casing - just need to find someone to open up their PC and let me test it out. My parents have got a stinky Dell - no good!

http://www.circuitcentral.com.au/USB-2.0-to-SATA-IDE-Adaptor-Cable-p-31757.html

Cheers Teq - had a friend point me in the same direction, but found some kit a bit cheaper than that. Will give it a bash.

A friends did something that sounded the same, turned out his power pack was screwey, wasn't delivering the correct power.

Yeah I'm hoping it is the power source on the casing that was damaged, rather than the drive itself. The SATA to USB cable I bought last night has been shipped, so hopefully I'll know by the end of the week if I can salvage my shiz.

My parents have got a stinky Dell - no good!

Dell's do have IDE and Sata ports :)

Aren't they a pain in the butt to get open or something?

They often have an unusual case design but they're fine to get open if you can work it out.

Once you know how it all works they're probably easier as there's no screws.

Majority of the ones I have worked on you pull a lever and the side comes off and thats it :) Quite a simple design.