Can I use this hard drive?

caniusethisharddrive

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3
Location
england
Hi,

I'm a bit of a computer noob and need some advice.

Basically, I had a laptop for a few years which was running poorly and had a few problems such as slightly damaged screen, no battery life left etc so decided to sell it.

I took the hard drive out to avoid anyone else getting personal data. So now, I have a 120gb sata hard drive. Can I use it still?

I couldnt format the drive because I had to users. Admin, and guest. I couldnt remember admin password so could only access guest account and wouldnt let me format from there.

I tried password recovery which I put onto a cd from creating through guest account but it wouldnt work, so no hope there. I kept getting a message saying it failed and to try again.

Anyway, pc is sold now, and i'm left with the hard drive.

Without checking, I bought a sata enclosure assuming I could simply put it in there, connect up to my main pc and wipe it clean. However, it doesnt show in my computer when I plug the external drive to my pc.

Is there anything that can be done with it now? Can I get my pc to recognise it so I can wipe it and use it as external drive?

Or should I just put a drill through it and bin it? :eek:

Thanks for any advice!
 
Thanks for the reply.. any more suggestions? Would love to use it as an external drive if I could rescue it sicne i bought the enclosure plus I wouldnt mind an external drive anyway
 
if he formatts it
everything will be erased
if you happen to have another hard drive
install linux
and see if linux can access it
linux accessed my hard drive that had something missing in the boot manager
i was able to recover all of my files and product keys with some leg work
you can run Ubuntu right from the Optical drive (Ram only) no install needed
you could also connect it to your pcs mobo and see if you can boot that way
but that would be more headaches then what you want
try linux
and get what you want from that hard drive
 
I dont know what you mean by format in fat 32

I don't mind about losing all files. I have a back up of this drive on my main computer.

I would just rather use this as external drive than bin it
 
Have you try formating it in fat 32

---------- Post added at 10:18 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:17 AM ----------

i would like to help you with this please email me at joe@officialunittbuster.co.uk

Joe :)
FAT32?

You serious?

Go into 'Run' in XP, or just go into the start menu and the search on Windows Vista/7

Type diskmgmt.msc

When plugged in, does the Harddrive show in the screen that shows?
 
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