Defective hard drive

[sixfourcop]

I have a Toshiba portable hard drive with a defective USB port. If I remove the case, can I remove the bridgeboard and connect directly to my laptop via USB or SATA port? If so, will I be able to recover my files and send to another hard drive? What cable or adapter will I need or could I just replace the bridgeboard? Thanks for any help.

 

[fzabkar]

Some bridges are integrated onto the HDD's PCB. Another complication is that some drives incorporate hardware encryption.