Windows 7 - Help with MBR

Hello:
I'm new to the forum and an intermediate computer user.
My roommate's laptop died and I'm trying to recover pictures and music from his HDD. (TOSHIBA MK1637GSX)
I connected it to an external case I have, thinking it was going to be pretty simple, but the computer is not recognizing the HDD but it recognizes the connection.
I don't know what to do and I don't want to give partition to the HDD for the computer to recognize it because I might lose everything in it.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

is the drive working? does it show up in disk management?

how did the laptop die?

his friend let it fell from his desk while they were working on a project.
and the computer was on so i think is the MBR that's damaged.

the device manager shows it under other devices >> unknown devices

If it fell, I suspect it to have mechanical damage (e.g. head crash). The MBR is just a bunch of records on the disk. Can you hear the disk spinning and are there strange noises?

yes, there are a few noises but only when i turn on the case, after that it just stays quiet. But i can hear it spin right before turning it on. And after it just sounds normal.

Unplug it from the PC and then plug it in again and see whether you get an autoplay. Another problem may be the driver for that disk. Normally it should be installed automatically, but if you know the make/model of the disk, it may be safer to get it from the manufacturers site.

I dont get an autoplay. it just reads USB to ATA/ATAPI Bridge.

its a TOSHIBA MK1637GSX
I looked for drivers but I didnt find anything

could it be the SATA drivers I'm missing?
or that doesnt matter since its connected through USB?

my main HDD is ATA, idk if that has anything to do with it

the disk management does show the disk but its unallocated.
it says i must initialize the disk before Logical Disk Manager can access it.
and it gives me two partition style options.
MBR and GPT
but im afraid that if i give it a partition i will lose all data that was there before :S
what should I do?

Open Disk Management. Click Action then click Rescan Disks. Rt-click any disk marked Foreign, click Import Foreign Disks, and follow the instructions on your screen.

If you are asked to Initialize to MBR or GPT - choose MBR.


If it still shows as unallocated (unlikely), then:


D/l this free bootable partition Manager - burn it to cd with isoburner - do not format the cd.

Partition Wizard Bootable CD allows user to boot computer directly to manage partition.

isoburn.exe.zip

Boot the cd and if it recognizes the HD - click Disk 1 at the top, then Partition Recovery in the left pane.

Try a scan of the unallocated space - try Quick scan first.