I have a failed Seagate Medallist ST34342A hard drive, need the data off it, so I have managed to purchase a working (exact model) drive.
My plan is to swap the discs into the working one to recover the data...sounds simple, but I know it wont be that easy!

I am an electronics engineer but this is certainly not my speciality, I understand about cleanliness etc but have no idea how to reprogram the drive re. timing constants (factory set?) etc

Anyone who has done this swapping before may have valuable advice they wish to share with me, which would be much appreciated!

I know professional services do it for about £250,....nuff said!!

What problem does the hdd have does it have bad sectors , clicking heads or
bad pcb ?

Thanks for response, the original drive was working perfectly (even when it became a bit noisy), thought I had backed everything up then (but hadn't!).
Finally the drive stopped responding (appeared to not be spinning up) and corrupts the other (master) drive (as faulty one was configured as slave on primary IDE).

Since then, I have opened the dustcover on bad drive, platters seem to turn but rather stiff (because of motor?)

So I'm hoping there may be a mechanical (motor) failure, if its just the firmware (as PC didn't appear to recognise the drive now) then I am not sure what software could repair it....any advice?

In most of the cases when the drive's motor is not spinning its a PCB problem
better find a donor hdd with same pcb and replace it with the bad one .

Thanks for that, first thing I'll try when I get the new drive!
I'm sure it'll be easier than swapping the disc's themselves

Swapping the Platters <Disc> is a very hard process requires special place <clean room> and alot of practice . Only recommended for professionals .
And the success rates in the platter swap is very low .

Changing the PCB is not a problem need Trox T8/T9 and good PCB and replace quite easy .