Laptop HD Help

Ok, so I have a Laptop HD from my brother's laptop and it won't boot in the laptop... saying it's missing a system file. I've tried doing a repair, tried reinstalling the OS (without format) and nothing seems to work.

So I bought one of those converters to stick the HD in my desktop computer just to get some files off of it before I do a wipe, however when I plug in the laptop HD into my desktop, it won't boot saying "invalid system disk" because what of what I assume: My main HD and this drive are both trying to be master... and I want this one to be a slave so I can pull the files onto my computer.

So is there any way to get these files transferred?? I don't want to wipe it clean before getting some important files off of it. And I know the HD is good.

And no, I cannot get into safe mode.

>>I've tried doing a repair, tried reinstalling the OS (without format)
Depending on what you mean by repair (it could be one of several things), both of those will remove any files that were not factory installed. In other words, you have probably already lost the very files you are working so hard to retrieve.

Unfortunately, I have little experience with laptop hardware so I cannot help you much. Does the laptop drive have a jumper specifying whether it is a master, slave or cable select? I am assuming we are talking about an EIDE hard drive.

No, it does not have any jumpers, and no, you are incorrect about the repair operation. All the files are intact, I'm quite sure of that. I just cannot access them or boot to windows.

How about Knoppix or another bootable cd distro?

I'd rather not go that route.

You could jumper the regular drive to always be master (SP jumper)

Try attaching the drives to the ATA cable in reverse order. The drive closest to the motherboard is the master.

You could also try attaching the drive to another ATA connector on the motherboard.

The regular drive IS the master (jumpered to be so). I didn't think about connecting it to the other cable. :eek: Thanks for the suggestion. :)

hey if that didn't work you could tell your brother to drop 20 bucks on a 2.5" external hard drive case (ide to usb). That would work and it wouldn't try to boot off it.

F it. I'm reformatting.

I hate formatting, it always takes me forever to get windows how I like it...