Ruined harddrive

Stupid me managed to break one of the connection-pins on my ATA hard drive.

Someone who know if there is some way I can still use this harddrive. Recover my data without sending it in to some company that bills my ass off, for example..?

It is an 2.5" ATA (Hitachi)

 

maybe try google?

 

I did try google, but cant seem to narrow down my search. Get like 90 million hits with "data recovery". Dont know what to write as search string to get what I need.

 

did you try this "replacing connection-pins on ATA hard drive" on google.

 

That narrowed it down a bit, but still most hits consider warnings about damaging the pins... which I already have done

Im not en hardware engineer so I find it difficult to sort out the relevant information. Like if the harddisk is completely broken when one of the pins is dead or if it just affect some minor ability..

 

When you say its snapped what exactly do you mean and is it a Power pin or a data read ribbon pin, and is any of that broken pin showing on HD. Also look in the ribbon connector and see if broken peice is still there as sometimes (if your lucks in) it may connect again with a hard push in its correct spot.

 

I dont know the difference of the pins, but there are many of them (about 40) One got bent pretty bad when I was trying to fit some kind of contact on them. When I tryed to bend it back it fell off (at its base) The contact I was trying to fit is some adapter or something - to make the hd fit on a Dell system.

These pins are positioned on the end of the hd and must serve both as powersupliers and datatransferers. Just for the record this is an ATA hd, think that tells how the pins look like

 

Have just read that it is possible to solder back the pin and try this site as it has some very useful info for your problem ,, good luck
http://deadharddrive.com/

 

LMAO!!

Thats a jolly good article!

It doesnt really solve my problem but the illustrations is worth it! xD
Though it does give me the idea I have to do a lot of tweaking to fix it, and thats impossible for me and my skills.

I was hoping I could use the hd with a broken pin, but it seems like rescue is beyond hope. (and cash)

RIP Harddisk....

 

I take it you've tried to run it with the broken pin, and found that the drive doesn't work with the pin missing.

Anyway, you're right -- in the ATA interface, there are 40 pins in the data cable connector, and another 4 in the power connector.

A few of the pins in the data cable header are grounds. The drive might operate even with one of those pins missing. Otherwise -- it will depend on which pin is missing, and what the function of that pin was.

The usual fix for that problem is to replace the logic board for at least long enough to get the data off the drive. I suppose you could get creative and find some other way to restore the connection, but you'd have to be pretty good with a very small soldering iron or something like that.

 

Well, I connected it and tried. Got the message: "Operating system not found" Didnt know if that was because of the pin or if it is something else. Have read in different "disk recovery manuals" to be carefull and turn off power etc if something happens to the disk..bla bla....

Wanted to check my possibilities before doing anything.

As long as I dont have to take in mind resistance in the wires I might or should be able to make a home-made version

 

Sory that the site was of no help but I thought there may have been a springboard to take you elsewhere... I always use www.alltheweb.com as a search which tends to give better results (non commercial) than Google. Try that search engine and type broken connection-pins on hard drive there are a few leads there one of which is below..

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=113632

 

Well, the link Toke provided suggests some approaches that might work. It's worth a try.

I doubt that resistance will be an issue unless you use a very long or very fine wire to bridge the gap. Capacitance or cross-talk from a neighboring conductor might be more of an issue.