Hi everyone,

I'm having problems with this hard disk, and I'll probably end up sending the drive to Kroll Ontrack or some other company that has an office here in Spain.

However, first I would like to ask you what do you think of the drive, and I'd love to have some advice from you (I'm not asking for free service, I know I'll have to pay a professional to recover any data, but I just want to know more or less how dire is the situation of my drive)

It's an IBM Deskstar IC35L090AVV207-0, manufactured in December of 2002. It has been working well until it simply refused to be recognized by the BIOS a few days ago. The computer itself works fine, it's only the hard drive which has suddenly failed for no aparent reason.

The drive doesn't make any sound, it's completely silent. I've carefully rested my hand on the drive while the computer is turned on and I can't even notice any vibration. It seems as if nothing is moving inside it!

I've connected the drive to the secondary IDE channel, and have run MHDD from a bootable USB flash drive. Then I've pressed F2 key but it says "Drive is not ready." I've also pressed the F8 key but I get the same error: "Drive not ready." On the upper side of the screen I can see the letters "BUSY" highlighted in green color. The rest of the letters are simply grey.

And that's it. I haven't tried any other command.

Are there any other non-invasive diagnostics that I could do? What are the chances of recovering the data?

Many many thanks in advance,
Kind regards.

The drive needs to be serviced - internal problem either logical or mechanical (by the fact it is not clicking). I have seen it many times.

There is no problem about "invasive" diagnose as the drive has isolated itself from the rest of the world - but don't do anything unnecessary.
Contact a pro in your area or live without data and replace it. It has reasonably worked for years now...
If you want to send the drive to Italy , drop me a PM.

P.S. don't poke with internet stuff NEITHER try another electronic board or you'll make things worse.

Sounds like the motor is not spinning up. Check that the ribbon cable going from the PCB to the motor did not come loose from the connector on the PCB. It happens on these drives sometimes. If you do not know how to work the connector ask first.

It seemed that the drive was already checked for this. Often these drives fail that way , but it's not a good idea to swap PCBs... guess why ...

Hexed, I've inspected the ribbon cable and seems to be OK. It's not loose and it doesn't present any sign of damage.

I confess that at first I was tempted to try some of those techniques, as suggested by many people over the web.

But, thankfully, I stumpled upon this forum and other specialized websites that told me: DON'T replace the PCB, DON'T put the drive in the freezer and DON'T hit it with a hammer!

It seems that there's too much disinformation about this all over the web.

Thanks again,
regards.