My HP Pavilion laptop has finally given up the ghost. I have another desktop PC and would like to retrieve the information from the hard drive on my Pavilion. Is this possible? How would I go about connecting it up to my desktop PC?

Would be grateful for any advice.

you can pick up adaptors to allow you to plug it in for about £10, I bought one ages ago.
Just try doing a search on dabs or ebuyer.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/2-5-Laptop-to-3-5-IDE-Hard-Drive-Adaptor-Cable-2-P-P_W0QQitemZ5797565811QQcategoryZ41994QQssPageNameZ WD4VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I think Maplins might sell them.ebay link (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/2-5-Laptop-to-3-5-IDE-Hard-Drive-Adaptor-Cable-2-P-P_W0QQitemZ5797565866QQcategoryZ41993QQssPageNameZ WD4VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem)

What would they call them?

2.5" to 3.5" adaptor, or laptop harddrive adaptor, or words to those effect.

Dont know why the links dont work. stick hard drive adaptor into ebay and it will bring them up.

It's ok. Found two on Maplin (one for 8.99 and one for 4.99) they both seem to do the same thing.

Thanks for the advice! :thumbsup:

Sounds like good advice unless its your hdd that has packed up, in that case the 2.5 to 3.5 adapters will be useless and you'll need specialist help for retreival (which can be very expensive)

I bought one of these (http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=138544) for pretty much the same purpose, after killing a laptop with lucozade (don't ask :rolleyes: ). You can imagine my annoyance when I found out it wasn't a normal 2.5" laptop drive! It was some really weird one with an interface looking *almost* like a CF card/microdrive, but not quite. I couldn't for the life of me find any adapter to fit that at a sensible cost.

The usb thingy I linked to above proved useful a couple of days ago when I wanted to get some data off a 3.5" drive though - 10 seconds work to plug it into a usb port and bingo, a drive letter appears in windows! :)

Originally posted by rich951
IYou can imagine my annoyance when I found out it wasn't a normal 2.5" laptop drive! It was some really weird one with an interface looking *almost* like a CF card/microdrive, but not quite. I couldn't for the life of me find any adapter to fit that at a sensible cost.


ZIF (Zero insertian force) sockets, my Rio has a ZIF socket for its hard drive, adapters for them are virtually none exisitant.

Joel

Would this also work for a Toshiba 1300e because the hard drive is inaccessible due to a dead battery which cant be replaced and even if it could wouldbe far to expensive because it is such old kit.

I got a great hard drive USB interface from this site:

http://www.directusbstore.co.uk/

They also sell USB aquariums which is a must have for all desktops!