Best way to recover files from Hard Disk Drive?

[Vern_in_IL]

I had a 2004 Gaming PC, the motherboard had defective capacitors(common at the time) They finally blew out, took out the BIOS and can't get video....


So I got a 70 Gigabyte IDE drive with Windows XP SP2, with some rare files on it.

What is the best way to get these files copied to my laptop? I got a IDE to USB converter, Can I just plug and play, copy over files, I do not think SP2/3 had encryption on the drive.

The laptop I'm using runs Windows 8, mainly audio and video files I need to copy over, very rare.

 

[JC1]

External Hard drive case (IDE I'm assuming) and try to plug it into your PC via USB to see what you can access.

Hopefully the drive still spins when it gets power.

 

[Jethro_Bob]

Quote
Can I just plug and play, copy over files,


Most likely yes, assuming the drive wasn't fried. Windows 8 may require you to "take ownership" of the files before copying. I can't find a link I personally feel trustworthy discussing it. But you do not need to download anything to do it. It may not even be an issue for you at all.

 

[Donald]

Originally Posted by Vern_in_IL
I had a 2004 Gaming PC, the motherboard had defective capacitors(common at the time) They finally blew out, took out the BIOS and can't get video....


So I got a 70 Gigabyte IDE drive with Windows XP SP2, with some rare files on it.

What is the best way to get these files copied to my laptop? I got a IDE to USB converter, Can I just plug and play, copy over files, I do not think SP2/3 had encryption on the drive.

The laptop I'm using runs Windows 8, mainly audio and video files I need to copy over, very rare.


If you have the IDE to USB converter then you should be able to copy the files. I assume you are also powering the drive? Not sure USB will power it.

You can run CrystalDisk Info on the drive. It will tell you the condition of the drive.

 

[Donald]

Then develop some kind of backup strategy. Never have any file only one place.

 

[Rand]

Originally Posted by Donald

If you have the IDE to USB converter then you should be able to copy the files. I assume you are also powering the drive? Not sure USB will power it.

You can run CrystalDisk Info on the drive. It will tell you the condition of the drive.


This is correct, you will need to power the drive with either a dedicated power supply (they sometimes came with ide->usb adapters)
or another computer.. I

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted by Donald
Originally Posted by Vern_in_IL
I had a 2004 Gaming PC, the motherboard had defective capacitors(common at the time) They finally blew out, took out the BIOS and can't get video....


So I got a 70 Gigabyte IDE drive with Windows XP SP2, with some rare files on it.

What is the best way to get these files copied to my laptop? I got a IDE to USB converter, Can I just plug and play, copy over files, I do not think SP2/3 had encryption on the drive.

The laptop I'm using runs Windows 8, mainly audio and video files I need to copy over, very rare.


If you have the IDE to USB converter then you should be able to copy the files. I assume you are also powering the drive? Not sure USB will power it.

You can run CrystalDisk Info on the drive. It will tell you the condition of the drive.


Yup, this. I have an old external IDE/USB DVD-RW enclosure that has what is basically a laptop power supply for it that works perfectly for this purpose. As Donald indicated, assuming the drive is OK, this should just "work".

 

[mk378]

> You can run CrystalDisk Info...

The SMART report is unlikely to work through a USB adapter. Drive would need to be connected directly to a (S)ATA port for that. That can also get you much faster data transfer but not necessary for a one-time thing.