Can't Access Data From Hard Drive Through USB Adapter

[robot09]

I've got a Toshiba MK1655GSX out of a Dell laptop that was running Windows Vista. My son knocked the computer off the table and it stopped working and will not boot at all. I've pulled the hard drive out of the laptop and have it in an Antec MX25 SATA to USB external Hard Drive case. I tried another old drive that i've formatted before and put new data onto in the case and that opens correctly.

I plugged it into a Windows XP Pro Computer and it takes a LONG time for it to read the drive. The drive appears in Device Manager as well as Disk Management. After about 10-15 minutes the autoplay(where it starts trying to read the drive) starts up and begins looking for files. It doesn't see any of the files and finishes.

In Disk Management it says the partitions on the drive are Healthy and has the partition that had the data on it marked as Active. It isn't showing any File System for the partitions on the hard drive.

My Computer sees the partitions but wants me to format the drive when i try to access the data off of it.

I need to recover the data as it has important files that cannot be replaced and that were not backed up (i.e. pictures of my grandfather from my wedding 1 month before he passed away).

Any ideas or help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[price_th]

You may find some of the disk recovery tools that recover partitions to be of some help. I wouldn't get my hopes up too much though. Professional recoveries can cost upward in the $1000's

 

[price_th]

One other thought, check your camera to see if the photos were ever deleted.

 

[robot09]

Unfortunately, the pictures aren't on the camera any more. My wife is too good about loading them onto the comp and once they're loaded deleting them off the memory card so that it's a clean card again. Most of them are loaded on facebook but it won't have anywhere near of good of quality as the original ones off the camera have.