Need help with possibly dead hard drive

[gamer145]

Hello people I wanted to ask is there a chance I accidentally killed my hard drive? you see I opened up the case of my pc because I wanted to check the specifications of my power supply then I touched my hard drive for like 1 second because it was dirty then put the case back on and turned it on, now it tells me "disk read error press ctrl alt del to reset" everytime I turn it on and no matter how many times I reset my pc it still tells me the same. I realized it happened because of what I did because it was perfect before that what should I do? is there a fix or is it dead? I feel like a big newbie now

 

[pdxalex]

Shut it off and take a look to ensure you didn't accidentally dislodge any cables... disconnect and reconnect the drive.

Unless the case is all-plastic, it would be hard to open a case without static discharge and a little nudge shouldn't be an issue either. I'd be surprised.

 

[Paperdoc]

I agree with pdxalex. It's more likely you just loosened a cable. SATA data cables (the 7-wire ones) sometimes come loose, especially if they are not the locking type. But check the power supply cable also, and the other end of the data cable that plugs into the mobo.