External Hitachi Hard Drive not beng recognized

I have a Hitachi 500 GB portable hard drive and it is not being recognized on any computer. It powers up when connecting to USB port and had drive makes 5 clicking noise. I am not sure if the hard drive has gone bad but would love to get files/photos that I have on the drive.
Would appreciate any support to pull the files off the hard drive and restore it afterwards!!

Thanks!!

 

Can you pull the hard drive from it's current enclosure and put it in another enclosure of the same type — by that I mean SATA to USB or PATA (EIDE) to USB? Have you tried using a different USB cable?

If neither nor both of those help, you may be faced with taking the drive to a data recovery service — OUCH! — that could cost $500 to $800!

In the event the drive HAS failed, I'd recommend you get a Western Digital Black Series drive. They're extremely dependable and have a 5 year warranty.

 

At the present time I don't have another enclosure of the same type and not 100%sure how to do SADA to USB or PATA to USB. Is there somewhere I can learn how to do it. I will try another USB cable and see if that helps but shouldn't it work if the light comes on the bottom of the drive as it is getting power.
Is there any cheaper solutions so I can get the pics and files from the drive.