Failing Hard Drive

[odunican]

Hello I bought a PC from pcspecialist around 2-3 years ago and everything has been fine. Just need a little help if possible to maybe try and save my hard drive.
Basically 2 days ago I went to start up my computer but there was a beeping clicking noise coming from inside. It wouldn't boot up to the windows and when I checked setup it says that there was no harddrive.

So I attatched a new harddrive to the pc and the clicking noise stopped and am about to install windows 7 on to it. However I am really upset that my old Hard Drive isn't working as it has all my games and lots of work and photos I need. I can't even get the old harddrive out to even see if someone can repair it because PC Specialist have screwed it in and I am unable to unscrew it as this would mean having to break the whole computer apart as there is a metal cover either side of the hardrive which to unscrew would mean unscrewing all the computer as it is all connected and I don't want to do this as it would ruin the computer if went wrong.

I don't have my warranty as it ran out so I can't have it repaired am just looking for advice. Also I've tried repairing it using the windows 7 disc and repair option but it says there is no hard drive to repair.

The Hard Drive is -640GB SERIAL ATA 3-Gb/s HARD DRIVE WITH 16MB CACHE (7,200rpm)

 

[Gorman]

What case is it?

It sounds like the hard drive is mounted in a removable drive cage. This cage will itself unscrew so you can remove it and then the hard drive.

 

[Frenchy]

As Gorman says it sounds like it is mounted in a removable drive cage.

My othe bit of advice, and I know this probably isn't what you want to hear right now, but hopefully lesson for the future. Always backup, no exceptions.

 

[Conn]

if your hard drive isn't showing up at all in the bios it's probably totally dead and this wont help (the clicking sound is a pretty bad sign)
doubt it would help but you could try unplugging the sata & power and using a diff sata port / power adapter to try and makesure something hasn't came loose somehow but in reality that clicking sound probaly indicates a bad mechanical failure and not an unplugged drive.


mine failed "S.M.A.R.T." status but was visible in bios so i could use
http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page
to back up most of the data

 

[mantadog]

Their are places that will try to recover your data for you, it's not 100% but many offer a service where if they can't recover the data they don't charge for it. You could be looking at spending £80+ to get the data back but it might be worth a shot if it has alot of stuff on it you need.