Best Ways To Recover A Dead Hard Disk: Solution By Experts

Your hard drive just stopped working. It never made any odd sounds like screeching, popping, or clicking, and it didn’t crash. It just quit and it has some priceless data that isn’t backed up to another device. This guide may help you troubleshoot and correct any problems related to your drive.
Basic Solutions :

• Power down the computer or disconnect the external drive.
• Stop using your computer or external hard drive.
• Remove the hard drive from the computer or device.
• Check if there are broken parts.
• Examine it carefully for ‘hot spots’ or other damage on the external controller board.

If you have a PATA (IDE/EIDE) drive, switch drive pin settings :

• Plug it in alone without any other device on that port and try again.
• If it was “slave” or “cable select,” set it to “master.”

Replace the cables:
Plug the hard drive in with new cables “power and data connection” that you know works and try again. Note that an IDE drive will need a flat-ribbon cable.
Plug it into an external drive adapter or external drive case :
If it does not spin up, try connecting it to another power source include data connection as some drives don’t spin up without. If on both it does not spin up, the fault is most likely related to the Printed Circuit Board.
Connect the drive into another computer and try again.If this works, it is possible that the motherboard is at fault and not your hard disk.
Using Linux to recover your Data :
Many times when windows can not see your drive its because the filesystem itself is damaged. In the case of a damaged filesystem, it would be wise to first take an image of the hard drive before running any type of “filesystem repair” utility. The reason for this is if you have a drive that has both filesystem damage as well as minor physical damage, you may make matters worse. Taking an image of the drive prior to attempting to fix it will allow you to always revert back to the original state.
You can boot up off of a windows XP installation cd and select the recovery console and once in a dos prompt use chkdsk to repair the file system like you see below. Replace (DRIVELETTER) with the applicable drive letter.
chkdsk (DRIVELETTER): /f
This will force windows to attempt to repair the file system itself. Newer versions of Linux may have the ntfs-3g program and ntfsprogs and it includes a program called ntfsfix which can help repair a windows ntfs file system so it can be mounted or booted
While you can try to mount the drive in a computer that is already running Linux you can also use a Live CD do the same without having to do anything other than downloading and burning the CD or building a bootable Linux system on a USB stick.

• Download a live disk. System Rescue CD is a good one for this application.
• Burn the .iso onto a blank CD with an Image Burner.
• Boot the computer, don’t forget to change the boot order in the BIOS.

Boot up a Linux system or mount the drive using a Linux live disk and begin to backup your data if Linux can see the filesystem.
Mount the drive by typing this command: mkdir /mnt/disk && mount -t auto /dev/sda1 /mnt/disk. If the drive is a IDE drive the command would be mount -t auto /dev/hda1 /mnt/disk assuming you only have one partition on the drive if in doubt Consult a basic linux guide for specifics.
Mount another drive and backup data. Again, consult a basic linux guide for specifics.
 Replace the Drive’s Controller Board :
Inspect the drive’s controller board carefully to see if it can be removed without exposing the drive’s platters. Most drives will have an externally-mounted controller board. If not, stop here.
Remove the controller board of the failing drive.

• Remove the screws with the correct screwdrivers. Most drives use Torx (star drive) head which is available at home repair stores. Be careful, the screws are soft.
• Learn everything about how it is connected to the drive. Most drives are connected via ribbon cables and pin rows. Be gentle. Do not crimp or damage the connectors.

Find a sacrificial drive.
It is important to match the exact same model number and stepping i.e. firmware revision, printed circuit board number. Matching drives can sometimes be found at places like eBay, inspect the photo in the auction carefully to determine if the model and firmware match. Contact the seller to be sure the drive being auctioned matches the picture prior to buying.