When HDD is plugged in, PC freezes on BIOS splash screen

[Zezima]

YEah, so.

 

A teacher was using her PC, she said she tried to save her document and had some "not responding errors" then it crashed.

 

When I arrived and booted the PC the first time it was trying to boot from USB (even though USB is underneath HDD in the list - i know this because i set them up over summer). I looked in the boot options and the HDD was missing.

 

I've tried a new HDD in that PC and now its working (just building a new image as i type this)

 

Ideally Id really like to try to recover a word document that the teacher was working on. The two PCs i have tried this HDD in do the same thing... just freeze on the BIOS splash screen.

 

any ideas to why this is happening?

[Oaktech]

YEah, so.

 

A teacher was using her PC, she said she tried to save her document and had some "not responding errors" then it crashed.

 

When I arrived and booted the PC the first time it was trying to boot from USB (even though USB is underneath HDD in the list - i know this because i set them up over summer). I looked in the boot options and the HDD was missing.

 

I've tried a new HDD in that PC and now its working (just building a new image as i type this)

 

Ideally Id really like to try to recover a word document that the teacher was working on. The two PCs i have tried this HDD in do the same thing... just freeze on the BIOS splash screen.

 

any ideas to why this is happening?

 

Apologies if this is stating the glaringly obvious... Because the HDD is spannered.

 

You could try putting the disk into a USB caddy and mounting it that way, but it's not unheard of for drives to fail spectacularly like this.

[LeMarchand]

Have you tried it in a USB caddy? (I suspect that the controller on the disk has gone, so you may not have any joy there).

 

Beaten to it!

 

If the HDD hasn't got the Tick of DOOM and you have a matching HDD it might be possible to swap the circuit over, but I'm sure I read that there are all sorts of reasons why this doesn't often work.

Edited December 10, 2015 by LeMarchand

[difinity]

Check the contacts on the hard drive PCB aren't to oxidised and clean them with a rubber. Check the TVS diodes, there are usually two, one on the 5v line and one on the 12v.