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Old 02-19-2008, 05:38 PM
Ronbo Ronbo is offline
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If you can get the exact same hard drive and have a small torx screwdriver try swapping the controller board. there will be one connector in the middle for platter motor, arm motor and head connection. (got a 50% chance here) Data recovery companies will whack you for $500 and this is the first thing they try.

If the drive isn't detected this sounds like the controller fried and the mechanicals are still good. Bad mechanicals will give a SMART error (as well as nasty sounds).

Laptop drives are prone to higher failure as they're exposed to bumps and temp extremes. Well worth it to get a USB external drive for $100 and back up often. If you want brute reliablity and speed put a SSD (solid state disk) in there. Very expensive but only true server grade drives (also $$$) share 2 million hour failure ratings.
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