Resurrecting Data From Dead Hard Drive

seekermeister said:

Those seem like good suggestions, but I don't think that any of them apply, except trying Linux. Actually, I did try to boot to Kubuntu, but for some reason, the video signal was lost prior to reaching desktop. I think that is a separate issue with the video card, and I ordered a new one last night.

Find a replacement logic board is not as easy as it sounds, and since the BIOS and SpeedFan sees it, I kind of doubt that is the problem. At the moment, I'm thinking that the logic board is okay and that the drive is physically okay. If that is so, I think that would leave the MBR. Is that not where information about the location and size of the partitions are?

Yes the parition table is in the MBR but I cannot see how that would affect the visibility of the drive just the ability of the drive to boot I think.
I guess disk management doesn't see the drive?
Stating the obvious again - cables checked?

Still try Puppy Linux - light live CD only couple hundred MB.

LiquidSnak said:

What drive is this, per chance?

Maxtor STM3500630A 500GB IDE.

mjf said:

Yes the parition table is in the MBR but I cannot see how that would affect the visibility of the drive just the ability of the drive to boot I think.
I guess disk management doesn't see the drive?
Stating the obvious again - cables checked?

Still try Puppy Linux - light live CD only couple hundred MB.

You may well be right, but since the problem occurred when I tried to delete a partiton on the drive with Disk Management, it seems as though something in the partitioning went south. For all practical purposes, Disk Management doesn't see it, because as long as that drive is connected, Disk Management will not open at all. Cables are not the problem.

I will try your idea of Puppy Linux, but I'm not too optimistic, because of the problem that I mentioned booting to Kubuntu.

Maybe you should have taken my eBay suggestion?
Someone appears to have looked it up.

LiquidSnak said:

STM3500630A items - Get great deals on Computers Networking items on eBay.com!

Wow!, that's great. A little expensive for just a logic board alone, but I will buy one anyway and keep my fingers crossed, because from what I read, normal changes over time may not let a replacment board work, even if it is an exact replacement according to the labels.

I guess that I should have looked for this myself, but my mind has been going in circles.

I may have gotten a break. I had left Disk Management "running" and it finally popped a window asking to initialize the drive. When I did that, it showed the entire drive as unallocated, so I used Disk Management to set a partition without formatting it. Now O&O DiskRecovery sees the drive, and it's in the process of searching the drive. I feel pretty good that it will work, but I'm still curious how deleting a partition could have had such repercussions in the first place.

Looks more likely an intermittent problem. Cable or logic board. Maybe a little heat on the board - who knows. I wouldn't trust the drive with anything important.