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Data recovery and disk repair questions and discussions related to old-fashioned SATA, SAS, SCSI, IDE, MFM hard drives - any type of storage device that has moving parts
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Laptop HDD spins but not detected in BIOS

November 20th, 2015, 23:14

HDD: Z5k320-320 (Hitachi)
Laptop: Toshiba Satellite C675D-s7109

http://puu.sh/lsZob/1624c7b715.jpg
http://puu.sh/lsZoV/6e98d7d748.jpg

(Note: I just need the data off this drive, but hopefully get it working too if I can)

So I'm not sure what to do at this point. The drive doesn't make any weird clicking noises, and it definitely spins (It's warm when I take it out), but isn't detected in the BIOS. I've tried the drive in another working laptop, it doesn't show up there either, and when I put a working drive in this laptop it boots just fine, so it's not the laptop. I also tried using this guide http://www.blog.creativform.com/how-to-check-your-hard-disk-for-bad-sectors/ (USB boot) but when I type hdat2 the drive doesn't show up there either. Changing AHCI to compatibility (IDE) doesn't do anything.

At first I thought it was the PCB, but everything I'm reading says if the drive spins, it's not the PCB. What other possibilities are there? Could it be the head? I was considering using this company https://outsourcedatarecovery.com/submit-service/step-1/ but if it's a mechanical problem, I don't know how much I'll get charged.

Since this is an older drive, can I try the freezer trick?

Thank you for any help.

Re: Laptop HDD spins but not detected in BIOS

November 21st, 2015, 11:21

Based on symptoms described backed by statistics, it is likely a firmware issue with high possibility of weak heads.
Sometimes these could be time-consuming to recover. The more fussing around with trivial solutions, the worse it will get.

Re: Laptop HDD spins but not detected in BIOS

November 21st, 2015, 16:55

Hey, thanks for the answers guys. I shipped it off to Outsource Data Recovery. I'll have it back in a week or so.
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