Hard Disk Recovery Needed

My Hard disk is not detected by the BIOS.I guess it's dead.So please help me to recover data form the dead hard disk

sata ide?

are there jumpers

new or used

if used how old

did you switch cables

did you switch ports

what happened right before the drive quite working

I have known some people who claim that they were able to recover data from a "dead" hard drive by wrapping it up in two zip lock bags and putting it in the freezer overnight. IF it comes up you need a new drive already installed to transfer data to because it may not last long and may not work more than once if it works at all.

If you do not have backups of your data the only other choice is a data recovery company. They are VERY expensive and their success rate is not as great as you might image. If the reason the drive is dead is that the heads crashed on the platter and damaged it there is little likelihood that anything can be done.

As orangegator said, backup your data. It is a hard lesson to learn.

Good Luck

Is it possible to find another like drive and change out the platters? I have a drive that I thought was dead and wanted to see the insides. Turns out the spindle was making all the noise and I think the data is still intact. Any suggestions?

lloydmuc,
I guess it varies, i have seen drives that are toast still get detected in the bios but be unusable. They are older, so may new drives just stop getting detected after they are toast.

bigbender_mike, Thats a very hard task, data recovery companies do perform such tasks(In a clean room). If you have nothing to loose go for it, but remember even a spec of dust can scratch the crap out of those platters rendering data(some or all) useless.