Downloading data of a dead pc?

[nick_f]

Hi my aunts PC tower has a power up fault but with it being 10yrs old she's swapping in a new tower pc,
How can I get the data of the existing hard drive onto the new pc?

Many thanks

[Jameseh]

Remove the hard drive from the old PC and get yourself an IDE hard drive caddy. Then it just works like an external hard drive.

[nick_f]

Hi there seems to be a few versions have got a good link sorry

[v0id]

Originally Posted by Jameseh

Remove the hard drive from the old PC and get yourself an IDE hard drive caddy. Then it just works like an external hard drive.

Or they could bypass the caddy, and plug it put it inside the new tower

[Dai]

Originally Posted by v0id

Or they could bypass the caddy, and plug it put it inside the new tower

Depends on the new mobo actually having an old-style IDE connector. It may be worth having a look but I think they're being phased out on a lot of new motherboards.

---------- Post added at 22:03 ---------- Previous post was at 21:58 ----------

Originally Posted by nick_f

Hi there seems to be a few versions have got a good link sorry

Something like this will do what you need:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Decrescent-T...pr_product_top

[Jameseh]

Originally Posted by v0id

Or they could bypass the caddy, and plug it put it inside the new tower

I thought that but the price of caddys and IDE-SATA adapters are quite similar and opening their new tower may void the warranty.

[Osem]

Originally Posted by Dai

Depends on the new mobo actually having an old-style IDE connector. It may be worth having a look but I think they're being phased out on a lot of new motherboards.

---------- Post added at 22:03 ---------- Previous post was at 21:58 ----------



Something like this will do what you need:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Decrescent-T...pr_product_top

Would such a device allow you to copy stored data from an old internal hard drive which had, for example, some sort of problem preventing it from starting up properly? I appreciate it's not going to work if the drive is totally knackered or seriously damaged.

[qasdfdsaq]

Yes

[Dai]

Originally Posted by Osem

Would such a device allow you to copy stored data from an old internal hard drive which had, for example, some sort of problem preventing it from starting up properly? I appreciate it's not going to work if the drive is totally knackered or seriously damaged.

If the drive spins up and if it's in healthy enough condition to be recognised as a drive by the BIOS then you're in with a chance. Otherwise it's basically game over unless you want to pay loadsa money to recovery specialists.

Do bear in mind that the window of opportunity on a failing drive can be measured in hours rather than days. Avoid powering up or down as much as possible as that stresses the drive more than anything else. Once you get it running stay with it until the recovery is complete or the disk dies.

[Osem]

Cheers guys