Reading a old HD

[bonkers72]

Have a old HD I want to read. Need to get the pictures off of it. It is SATA. Pluggged it into my pc, after disconnecting my main HD, but it asks to boot from CD/ROM. I don't have a cd for that HD. What can I do to successfully read it? Thanks.

 

[LittleJay]

Your computer can't boot without your main HDD plugged in because that is where Windows is installed. Do you have another SATA cable and power supply cable to hook the old HDD up? If so, rehook your main HDD up to where it was plugged into before and then use another available SATA port to hook up the old HDD. Windows should install the proper driver for and you should be able to copy files from it.

 

[LittleJay]

If you don't have another SATA and power cable, then another option would be to download a Linux Distro and create a live CD, which you can boot up into from your DVD and/or CD drive and transfer the files from the old drive.

 

[bonkers72]

Yes I do have another SATA cable and power supply cable. I'll try it later on, thanks for the info.

 

[LittleJay]

You are welcome. Let us know how it goes.

 

[bonkers72]

Finally got a chance to try it. Looks like on start up, it identified the second HD, but it was stuck on the windows start up screen. (windows is starting up) Thanks

 

[LittleJay]

Are you saying that Windows hangs at startup with the old drive plugged into another SATA port, or did it finally boot? I wasn't sure from your last post.

 

[bonkers72]

"Windows hangs at startup with the old drive plugged into another SATA port"........Bingo, yep.

 

[LittleJay]

The only other thing I can think of is if you have another Windows installation on the old HDD. That might cause it not to boot. You don't happen to have, or know someone who has an external USB HDD enclosure, or HDD dock? With USB you could then plug in the drive after Windows has booted and see if it works. Another option who could try is to download a Linux distro, like Ubuntu or Mint, and burn it DVD. With that, you can boot up Linux from your DVD drive and see if it will recognize the old HDD. If so, you could copy the files to your new HDD.

 

[LittleJay]

Another Linux distro I just thought of is called Puppy Linux. It is small and designed to be run from either live CD, or flash drive.

 

[bonkers72]

Yes I know for sure there is another windows installation on there. And yes I happen to have a external HD connected to my current system. My external HD has a USB and Sata connection in the back. I have it currently connected via Sata to my system. How do I go about hooking up the old HD then? Boot up my system as normal with the external HD turned on,then plug in the old HD via a USB/Sata connector? (cus I need one end to be USB to fit in the back of the external HD and the other end (Sata) into the old HD)....right? Thanks for the help.

 

[3D Jed]

If there is Windows on the old HDD, hook them both up but go into BIOS at start up and set your regular HDD as the first boot device.

 

[LittleJay]

Yes I know for sure there is another windows installation on there. And yes I happen to have a external HD connected to my current system. My external HD has a USB and Sata connection in the back. I have it currently connected via Sata to my system. How do I go about hooking up the old HD then? Boot up my system as normal with the external HD turned on,then plug in the old HD via a USB/Sata connector? (cus I need one end to be USB to fit in the back of the external HD and the other end (Sata) into the old HD)....right? Thanks for the help.

edit: You can try seeing if the old HDD will boot, that would be the easiest way, but if for some reason it doesn't, then you can try the suggest below.

No, I was talking about a HDD enclosure you could put the old drive into, or HDD dock. What you need to do, since there is another OS on the old HDD, is to use a system repair, or a Windows installation disk to boot your system up into with just the old HDD hooked up to the system. The reason for this is it makes it simpler to use diskpart. Then open command prompt and follow these steps.

1) type "diskpart" (without the quotations) and press enter.
2) type "list disk" and press enter.
3) type "select disk #" (# being the number that is shown for your old HDD) and press enter.
4) type "list partition" and press enter
5) type "select partition #" (#being the partition the OS is on) and press enter
6) type "inactive" and press enter. That's it. I think you should be able to hook your new HDD back up and it should boot up now.

 

[3D Jed]

The OP says he has SATA and power connector, so no need for diskpart, external caddy or Linux, just hook both HDs up internally and set BIOS to boot from original HD

 

[jimbo45]

Have a old HD I want to read. Need to get the pictures off of it. It is SATA. Pluggged it into my pc, after disconnecting my main HD, but it asks to boot from CD/ROM. I don't have a cd for that HD. What can I do to successfully read it? Thanks.

Hi there
Easy way --get a Cheap USB==>sata adapter then plug in to USB port. Works every time.

Here's a UK link -- similar in other countries.

Easiest way to access old HDD's without having to open up Laptop or workstation Mobo.

USB to IDE & SATA Cable Kit USBNow.co.uk

Cheers
jimbo

 

[bobafetthotmail]

another thing you can try is hotswapping. THat is, boot your computer with the old hard drive disconnected, then connect its data cable and then its power cable.

WIthin a reasonable amount of time (less than 5 minutes) it will get recognized and added to My Computer, if not disconnect and try again a few times.

That's something that works with my prehistoric hardware so should work with yours as well.