Hello, this is my first time posting to this forum and also my first time working on a hard drive. I have recently become interested in data recovery as I lost a 1TB drive with every film project that I ever did in film school on it. I would like to recover that information even though some of it was already backed up, but would like to practice before I work on that drive.

So, I have a Maxtor DiamondMax 10 100GB hard drive that failed over the weekend, it will be a good hard drive to practice on since the data isn't that important. I mean it's important that I succeed in the recovery, but if I were to mess up it wouldn't be the end of the world. The drive enclosure was turned off Saturday night using the power switch, on Sunday evening I turned the power back on and the drive wasn't recognized. I tested the enclosure with another drive and found that to be working fine. The drive makes the usual start up noises when the power switch is turned on then the drive just spins. After doing some research I have come to believe that it might be a PCB board issue, is this a correct assumption? I hope it is because I went and bought what I hope is the same exact drive and am looking to do a PCB board swap.

Any advice on doing the board swap?

Thank you guys in advance as I'm sure to receive knowledgeable answers as it seems that most of you are experts in this field. If this first one is a success I would also like to recover three more failed drives that I have sitting around before I move on to the 1TB drive.

Connect the drive directly to the SATA port in an PC and check in the BIOS,
avoid using the enclosure if you can.
When powered on , listen closely , for heads initialization or clinking sounds.
When the drive powers up and spins , the PCBs are not faulty (most of the time, not always though),so a board swap may not give you the desired result.
Also a straight PCB swap wont work , when adaptives are involved, and so you may have to swap the rom too.
DIY has its risk , so think and choose .

DiamondMax 10 100 GB....

Really ?

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Must have been THAT one.

The latest I have seen was 5 years ago or so.... (hence the "REALLY ? ")