
The two hard drive interface types: SATA, left, and IDE (aka PATA), right. The enclosure must also support the correct interface used by that drive: IDE/EIDE/PATA, or SATA. Two common hard-disk drive sizes.Ĭurrent drives are either 3.5 inches or 2.5 inches wide, and the enclosure must match. You need to get the correct-sized enclosure for the physical size of your drive. These are almost identical to any external USB drive, except there’s no drive inside. Perhaps the most flexible way of dealing with a hard drive in a dead computer is to purchase a USB hard-disk drive enclosure. If those options don’t work or don’t help, it’s time to try something else. (If not, you can get your money back.) SpinRite boots from its own media and can attempt to both diagnose and possibly repair errors on the disk surface. If you can’t boot at all, or if CHKDSK doesn’t help, it might be worth buying SpinRite to see if it can repair the drive. That will scan the disk for surface errors that can cause the disk to become inaccessible. If you can boot the machine into safe mode, then the place to start is to run CHKDSK /R on the drive. And, occasionally, there are other reasons - like a last-minute change that was important, but not yet saved online - that might still require retrieving data off the dead drive. Unfortunately, the reality is that most people don’t have a comprehensive backup plan in place. Simply do your work in a DropBox folder, remember to “Save” periodically, and even if the machine dies completely, the work in progress will have been saved online.
