Can I retrieve info from my old hard drive?

Well, here we are again, a few months after my computer went kaflooie….if ya all remember, my windows got corrupted and Staples wanted $195.00 minimum to TRY to get my windows back up and operating….. so, I went and bought a new computer, but I have realized over the last couple of months that I really do have some files in the old computer that I really do not want to lose. If my windows program wouldn't open and was corrupted, is the hard drive still viable and could my poetry files be retrieved by those hard drive back up systems I see for sale everywhere or won't that work because even if I do plug in the old computer, it won't start up because of the windows issue….. what I mean to say here is can those hard drive retrieval thingies still work without windows having to start up????

Greetings, If the hard drive is mechanically functional you can either install it into your new computer as a slave drive (or if SATA just as an additional drive) and you should be able to access the data without any software. Another alternative is to get an external enclosure for it. Your current OS should be able to access all the data on that old drive.

What you can achieve depends on the drive and set up, being store bought I highly doubt they used raid (multiple drives as a single drive), so that means we are dealing with single drives, thats a major plus, now without knowing how badly the drive was corrupted we can't be sure what to expect, so I will start with plan A, and I have a small hope it will be all thats needed, but it will require you to open the sides on the new and the troubled system, are you going to be OK with that ?

Don't panic if you've never been inside a system before, so long as your comfortable following instruction we can walk you through it, so what I will do here is tell you what we need to do, and once you look inside with the instructions here and you feel confident to go ahead and try then great, if you still have doubts, or your worried about something in the way let us know and we can tell you what to do and expect, so just holla if you need more info than this, but needless to say take care not to damage the board or anything while inside there.

To start remove the mains lead, then remove the side of the troubled system, this will be 2 screws on the edge at the rear, some use thumb screws so you don't need a screwdriver, others you need a cross head (pozi) one, you will also need this for removing the hard drive from the troubled system.
With the screws removed the panel can be removed, some are stiff, others fall off almost, but "most" sides slide back away from the front for an inch or so, then they can be lifted off, next position yourself and the case in a convenient place to work, laying the case on it's side so it's flat is often a help for most of this procedure.

Now remove the 2 leads from the hard drive, there are 2 kinds of hard drive, ide and Sata, they are easily identifiable, basically the ide drive has a really big data plug (2" or so wide approx), Sata are much smaller, take note of each lead as it comes out, they are shaped so will only fit 1 way, so with that in mind by looking you will know what to expect, if it's ide note which way up the notch on the plug is so you know how to plug it in shortly.

The only thing left now is to physically remove the drive, there are anything from 2 to 4 screws, there "should be" 4, but it depends on who put it together, and TBH 2 screws are fine really given most never touch the system after it's placed where it's used, so undo the 2 screws on the cage holding the hard drive, see if the drive is loose by trying to slide it back toward the rear of the system, don't force it, if it doesn't move easily there is more screws on the other side.

To access those stand the system up if needed, and remove the other side panel in the same way as the 1st, but when you try to slide it you may need to use some force, in my experience they are pretty tight, one trick I use if it is that tight is get a flat head screwdriver, now insert it at ANY vantage point on the rear edge and twist it, the side should move easily when you get a good start then it will come off easily once loose, with that off remove the remaining screws and remove the drive sliding it toward the rear.

Thats the hard bit done lol, don't panic, it may seem like a nightmare but trying to explain it in writing is far harder than doing it, so don't worry as you read through this, just take it a step at a time and you will be fine.
With the drive in your hand, and only if it was an ide drive, you may need to change the jumper settings, in short there are 3 options, Ma\Sl\CS (Master\Slave\Cable Select), the drive will have a diagram or note about which pins are for what, I suggest setting it to CS, you may already find it is set to that, in which case leave it there, otherwise remove the jumper thats probably there, and replace it on the CS pins.

With the drive free you can move that case aside, now it time to remove the mains and side as you did with the other case, now you need to note if it is the same type of drive, or if it is different, it just means we connect it differently thats all if needed, and we will cover that if needed, so simply insert the drive into the cage, you will need to decide whether above or below the existing drive is better dependant on where the leads are (mainly ide drives here), and with the drive in place you can put 1 screw there to steady it if you like for sorting the leads, then remembering how they were plugged in on the other system plug them in again and we should be good to go.

There are a couple of points to note with the drives, first ide drives have master and slave settings, CS simply automatically selects the correct one dependant on which plug you use on the lead, so the master is ALWAYS on the end plug, and the slave on the middle plug, and dependant on how your lead is placed with the existing drive, and bearing in mind the notch on the plug has to be a specific way up.
You will find putting the drive on the wrong side of the existing one means you will have to twist this lead to get it in the right place which could damage it, hence the warning about seeing whether above or below is best.
Sata drives do not have that problem, BUT, the leads have edges\notches and they have to go in a specific way round, and it is not uncommon for these leads to break if they are forced, so take care with these connections.

I dare say there are numerous little bits I've overlooked, but hopefully you will be fine with this, needless to say any worries just holla and we will cover those as needed.
so with the trouble drive in the new system you can replace the side, only needs 1 screw to hold it really for this bit, you will probably find it easier to do this laid on it's side, when done stand it up and plug it ion again then fire it up.

All being well it will load up, but you may get a message saying new device installed restart to complete type message, just reboot the system, it's just acknowledged the new drive, it may not ask in which case great, now click on Start - My Computer and you should see the old hard drive showing, simply go into it and see if you can find your files and cut and paste them onto the new systems drive, which should be C as a rule, but I have seen exceptions.

The most likely place your files will be in is in the Documents and Settings - Your User Name - My Documents, obviously check out the other folders to check you haven't missed anything, this is ultimately what I hope you will be able to do, and assumes you can read the drive, if not then it gets harder, but a word of warning, should you get a message come up saying the drive needs to be formatted to use the drive say NO, this will wipe ALL data from the drive, and recovery is hit and miss.

Now to finish off with a few links to pic's to help explain some of what I have described above, then when you look at yours hopefully all this will drop into place, so see how you go, and feel free to holla with any questions\worries etc and we will help you through this.
Sata Hard Drive (gives a detailed look at Sata drives)
ide Drive (not perfect, but is hopefully enough to show what I mean)

holy moly…….. i'm trying to breathe…… well……well. ummmm. ok……. this will take maybe 10 more times reading this over and over and over again, alot of courage and alot of time …….. I'll have to seriously sit down with all of this and decide if a total 60 year old computer moron can make heads or tails of this….. thank you so much for your time and your expertise and I'll get back to you when I have fully digested and hopefully been able to do all of this. you were very kind and as always i am in awe that there are people such as you with such smarts and generosity of heart. brightest blessings.

Yeah I appreciate putting that into text must look overwhelming, but honestly it's not really, in simple terms you just remove a few screws unplug a couple of leads and your done, the drive is out, then reverse this and it's in the other system, so please don't be to worried about this, what I suggest is open the 1st case and have look with the above guidance to help explain what you see, you don't need to touch anything except remove the side, once you see what this describes hopefully you will feel more at ease with this. None of the above requires special skills, and as I said above it makes it look much worse than it is, just look at each piece of instruction above as individual steps, and take them 1 at a time, you will soon have the hard drive in your hand, just holla if you have any concerns. P.S. I'm in no way smart, I was exactly where you are years back, it's only following forums and help such as this I know what I do today, so if I can do it anyone can.

well, I have already opened up my computer once before when I was trying to figure out if I actually had a floppy disc hooked into the port, so we'll see how easy it is to get that hard drive out ……… I so appreciate all the kind people here, but I know I will never be able to garner enough computer knowledge to dispense advice!!! I just don't get how these things work, what the process is…. I sincerely believe anyone who can figure these goll dang infernal machines is a true blue genius….so that means you!!!!!!! thanks again, I'll let you know what happens.

You'd be surprised, yes there are very clever people out there who understand all this, they are clever, but most are probably like me, we started out where you are now, and as things go wrong etc and we get help such as this we then start to pick up some basic knowledge, and the more you do it, and the more problems you have, the more you end up knowing, In my case I've had a few problems, but through helping mates I deal with no end of various problems, and thats the only reason I know what I do now, so don't worry, as long as you have common sense and can follow advice there is not much you can't achieve.

I have the same problem. tring to reccover data from an old hard disk drive. I have read about something called a hard disc USB adapter, cost about $20.00. Sounds too good to be true. Can you advise? Thanks.

I suspect you're talking about a docking station, it connects to the working system via USB, some have eSATA, then you simply plug a hard drive into it to access it without opening your systems case, very handy tool if you do this a lot, in fact I am contemplating getting one myself, but there is a major draw back with these things, they only take Sata drives, well I have never seen one for ide drives anyway, because I was hoping to find a dock capable of both drive types due to the number of various drives I deal with, and this is made worse if you want to include laptop hard drives, well ide ones anyway, because they are a different size, Sata it make no difference the dock can take any Sata drive, but not ide. Now unless you do this a lot it is not worth the money to get a dock, BUT, that said, if you are really that unsure about going inside a system then this is an excellent choice as it requiters no special knowledge, but again this only helps if you have got Sata hard drives, also don't think such a dock will allow you to recover data, it wont, what it does allow though is for you to access the hard drive placed in the dock and drag any files you may want to keep, and you can do the same thing without a dock using the above guide, but that only applies if you can see them, if the drive is corrupted and you can't see\access it then the dock will not make it any more accessible, hope that explains a bit.

8210Guy, Thanks for the response. The item I am speaking about is called "usb hard drive cable adapter" and it is available to use on the IDE or Sata drive according to the listing. I found it on the Tiger Direct website, item #40112 but I am certain it is available on many other sites. There is something else listed called the docking station that is probably what you are talking about. If you have time, would appreciate your taking a look and advising me since I am truly a "greenie." Thanks again.

This is what you need 8210GUY: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx…N82E16812156017

Possiby the OP also. I currently have about four of these because they are used all the time, and are invaluable.

I have 4 different brands of these things. The one I linked above is the one I have had the best luck with. All the other ones regularly drop my connection when using SATA drives. I think it has to do with the extra piece of cable that you have to use to connect to the SATA drive with the one linked above. It makes for a better connection.

Thank you very much. I plan to buy one. I will let you know if I am successful transferring my data. I tried the way you described originally but for some reason I cannot get the correct "pin configuration" on the old drive to make it work with the newer computer. When I turn the computer back on it keeps asking me to reconfigure my CMOS or press "delete" to exit. ??? Thanks for all your help. This is a wonderful site.

This is what you need 8210GUY: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx…N82E16812156017

Ah I was hoping such a beast existed, couldn't find one here though, only Sata ones, This is the one I was looking at, eSATA but no ide, I take it that one does laptop ide as well does it ?
Might have to look for one here, would save me a lot of messing around with all the systems I deal with, Thanks for that.

I tried the way you described originally but for some reason I cannot get the correct "pin configuration" on the old drive to make it work with the newer computer. When I turn the computer back on it keeps asking me to reconfigure my CMOS or press "delete" to exit. ???

There are a couple of things here, 1st is the jumpers on the drive itself, initially they may be set as master, because thats what it was, you need to set the jumper on the drive to tell it to be a slave then the system knows how to treat it, the jumper has 3 settings, Master, Slave and CS (Cable Select), some systems are fussy about using CS, and vice versa, there should be a guide on the hard drive to show each position, mind you they can be hard to see so you may need to view it from several angles and lighting, so if CS doesn't work try slave and vice versa.

The CMOS settings again may being affected by this as well, so getting that right may help, also when you connect to the drive make sure you use the centrer plug as that is the position for the slave drive, also by switching drives it may be the system has incorrectly change the boot priority so it needs to be told which drive to boot too again, but the cable you saw is a simplified dock really, a bit more portable than a dock and for one off cases like this may be the better choice, hope you get a solution that works for you.

Yeah… The adapter I linked does 2.5" IDE, 3.5" IDE, and SATA. It plugs in through USB (sure you noticed), not eSATA. I don't want to sound like I am saying this is the best adapter you can buy. But, I have used 4 other ones and this is the best one I have used. The price is right also. I will say that the power supplies that come with all the units I had, including this one, are REALLY cheap. The first thing to do with these is take electrical tape and wrap the rubber reinforcement around the cord right where it exits the power supply at. It will definitely break easy if you don't reinforce it. Also, I had the actual "AC" side of the power adapter cord (the regular computer style power cord) go bad that was sent along with one of these units. Just to tell you how cheap some of the components are. Ofcourse, like I said, I use these ALL the time. They get pretty beat up by my techs and I.