HELP!!!! hard drive recovery

[McDavis17]

So i bought a new hard drive for my dads computer as his old one is too small and seems to be slow as hell in the recent past. I decided to run a system clean-up and fragmentation before switching the data. I had the case open and the hard drive out of its slot, when I managed to stub my toe (rather painfully) on the case. I did not realize any difference on the screen at first, but it seemed to be taking an absurd amount of time to find files to clean-up. When I touched the mouse the cursor stayed put. I instantly knew what had happened and shut it down and upon closer inspection found the power cable ever so slightly jarred from the back on the hard drive because it moved when I kicked the case as it was not in it's proper place. now when I start the comp I get a nasty-gram saying Bios version yada yada yada, no SATA drive found, f1 to reboot f2 for setup. All of our pictures from trips and a fair amount of my dads work is on that computer and it would be amazing if i could get it back. I have data rescue PC demo for this computer to see what is salvageable, but I don't imagine that this computer will even be able to find it.

Thanks for reading,
Dave

 

[Guest]

Does it make any ticking noises? It takes a good bit of force to kill a hard drive. I doubt you kicked it hard enough to make the drive undetectable in BIOS. It should at least come up and say it has a hard drive. Double check cables, etc. You may have cracked a SATA connector. Try a new cable. Try it on a different connector. Also you could try putting it into another computer and try your data copy that way. Let it be a last resort to run ANY data recovery software. Try all other options FIRST.

 

[McDavis17]

Hi and thanks for your reply,
I believe I pooched the PCB as the computer starts and the hard drive sounds like it spins for a second, but no ticking noise, and then the computer case itself makes a beep before sitting idle at a black screen with a flashing cursor and the message. I looked around for similar problems on the internet but no luck. I just assumed that as long as it could access memory before, as long as there is no physical damage, a new PCB would revive the old girl. I ordered it 5 days ago, should arrive soon, I will repost if it works.



Edit: I have been looking around online and on some websites it says that even if you have a replacement board from the same model it may not work because of the "customized firmware". I have taken the board off and the contacts look to be in good shape and there is no visible damage to the drive itself. has anyone damaged their board and gotten it to work again by replacing the board?
thanks