Computer guru's... Help/info needed

**OreoLt1** · 01-19-2011, 07:46 PM

I have a Dell Dimension desktop PC that was hit by lightning years ago. My understanding is that the motherboard was toast. I removed the hard drive and tested it in another identical Dell PC and everything was still there and accessible. I have tried another known good motherboard and power supply and it may have shorted the newer board. I no longer have this spare PC so my question is...

Is there some sort of external hard drive or some way I can retrieve/copy everything from the data occupied hard drive to an external without the occupied hard drive being connect to a PC?

Any info would be highly appreciated

**ls1camino** · 01-19-2011, 08:44 PM

So you want the data on the fried computer's HDD onto an external HD? This can't be done by itself, you need a computer in the middle.

From what I'm reading, you don't want to throw the "fried" HDD into your new computer, but you want to put the data onto an external, correct? Why not just put it straight onto your new computer?

Go onto Newegg.com and look up "3.5 external enclosure"...that should be what you need.

**Spaz** · 01-20-2011, 06:49 AM

Originally Posted by ls1camino

So you want the data on the fried computer's HDD onto an external HD? This can't be done by itself, you need a computer in the middle.

From what I'm reading, you don't want to throw the "fried" HDD into your new computer, but you want to put the data onto an external, correct? Why not just put it straight onto your new computer?

Go onto Newegg.com and look up "3.5 external enclosure"...that should be what you need.

i think he is just looking for data transfer to a new HD... should jsut be a plug in and cna transfer shit via windows explorer...

**krese** · 01-20-2011, 11:35 AM

if you are saying the hard drive killed the spare system i would have to say that i doubt it very much. 15+ years and i have never seen such a thing. the drive could kill an ide or sata port MAYBE but the level of power in the communication between the motherboard and the drive is too low to cause motherboard to die. if you want to get the data off the drive then just buy yourself a cheap ide or sata to USB converter then copy it off that way. i know anything is possible but i have major doubts the drive killed your spare system. if that was the case i doubt like hell you ever would have seen any data on the drive at all.

**KMdef9** · 01-20-2011, 03:40 PM

Originally Posted by OreoLt1

I have a Dell Dimension desktop PC that was hit by lightning years ago. My understanding is that the motherboard was toast. I removed the hard drive and tested it in another identical Dell PC and everything was still there and accessible. I have tried another known good motherboard and power supply and it may have shorted the newer board. I no longer have this spare PC so my question is...

Is there some sort of external hard drive or some way I can retrieve/copy everything from the data occupied hard drive to an external without the occupied hard drive being connect to a PC?

Any info would be highly appreciated

Yes.

What ls1camino said. They're external HD cases for internal hardrives. Sometimes they dont even require a case.

Can even get them at bestbuy if you want to overpay.

**KMdef9** · 01-20-2011, 03:46 PM

I bought THIS years ago.

**OreoLt1** · 01-20-2011, 04:55 PM

I know its hard to explain and I'm poor at doing so but let me try again...

Computer "A" has the data I need and was the one that was fried but the hard drive is still good.

Computer "B" ( which was identical to "A")was given to me in working condition. So i swapped mother boards and it powered up for a second then acted just like Computer "A" in way of not running/powering up or anything.

I now only have hard drive from Computer "A" and need to copy/retrieve data from it so I can transfer it to my dell laptop with Vista.

Any reccomendations on how to do so?

**krese** · 01-20-2011, 05:21 PM

as i stated, figure out if the drive is IDE or sata then get the appropriate ide/sata to usb cable for it. you plug the drive in to one end (along with the power adapter that comes with it) and the other end goes in to your USB port on the pc that you want to copy the data on... it's simple as pie...

what i don't get is that you sated that the old pc was struck years ago.. that leads me to believe that the data on it is years old... why the hell do you need data off that from years ago?

example IDE to usb adapter:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-036-_-Product

**OreoLt1** · 01-20-2011, 09:11 PM

Originally Posted by krese

as i stated, figure out if the drive is IDE or sata then get the appropriate ide/sata to usb cable for it. you plug the drive in to one end (along with the power adapter that comes with it) and the other end goes in to your USB port on the pc that you want to copy the data on... it's simple as pie...

what i don't get is that you sated that the old pc was struck years ago.. that leads me to believe that the data on it is years old... why the hell do you need data off that from years ago?

example IDE to usb adapter:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-036-_-Product

It has pictures of value along with old tax documents and reciepts. Thank you guys for your help!

**KMdef9** · 01-21-2011, 01:15 PM

You need to buy something to hook your hardrive up to your laptop.

Do you have a USB on your laptop? If so, you can take the harddrive you want the data off of, hook up the device I recommended or others did to your laptop and copy the files needed.

**tnthub** · 01-22-2011, 04:49 AM

Just pick up a docking bay or external case for the hard drive and plug it into the vista laptop via usb?

**korndawg** · 01-31-2011, 05:20 PM

Originally Posted by krese

as i stated, figure out if the drive is IDE or sata then get the appropriate ide/sata to usb cable for it. you plug the drive in to one end (along with the power adapter that comes with it) and the other end goes in to your USB port on the pc that you want to copy the data on... it's simple as pie...

what i don't get is that you sated that the old pc was struck years ago.. that leads me to believe that the data on it is years old... why the hell do you need data off that from years ago?

example IDE to usb adapter:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-036-_-Product

We use those at work. VERY handy!

**oo7steven** · 02-15-2011, 09:45 PM

I am an IT Tech by trade. As others have said, if you would like to connect it to a laptop, the easiest way is grab an external hard drive enclosure.

Left hand side is an IDE, right hand side is a SATA.

If the hard drive came from a desktop computer then it is most likely a 3.5 inch hard drive. Grab an 3.5 inch enclosure for the correct port, then plug the hard drive into it, and connect the usb cables to the laptop and it should pop up as an additional drive.