Help Required - HDD PCB

[solidback]

Hi, I hope someone can help me out here. I have been using an IDE hard drive for storage, and yesterday it stopped working.
The problem seems to be the PCB, and in particular the circuit controlling the motor. I've been advised to try to obtain a PCB from another drive and swap them over.
I have all my photographs on the drive along with other files which are going to prove very difficult if not impossible to replace.
So does anyone have a Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 IDE drive which they no longer require? Preferably one which is showing bad sectors or a failing motor.
The manufacturing date on this one is 13/9/2003.
If any other info or pics of the board which would help, I can sort this out when I get home from work.
I'm pretty desperate to get the files off the drive as there are photos of my dogs as pups and of people who are sadly no longer with us.

 

[solidback]

Hopefully have a solution to this. A guy in Canada sells these boards on E Bay so I've paid up and will keep my fingers crossed that it all comes good when the board arrives.

 

[Phil]

try putting the drive in a waterproof bag and then leaving it in the freezer overnight and then reconnect it to the computer. Sounds daft but it does work and you may be able to get your data off before it fully warms up again.

Phil

Used this on numerous drives at work to recover customers data.

 

[solidback]

Never heard of this, but I'll give it a try. I attached another PCB to the drive which I was pretty sure would not be able to read the platters, but it did spin the drive up which confirmed that the motor controller circuit is faulty.
I'll stick it in the freezer and see what happens.