Comments on: Powerbook Hard Drive Help

Question: Powerbook Hard Drive Help

pfuller — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 08:42:42 -0800

How do I recover data from a Powerbook hard drive?

I'm pretty sure I fried my logic board by spilling a drink on my Powerbook (G4, Titanium). It will not power on at all, no firewire target mode, no safe mode, no chimes, nothing (although I can get the caps lock light to turn on and off). It's over 4 years old, so I'm not going to get it fixed, but I would like to recover the data on the hard drive and transfer it to my iMac G5. Is there any cheap/easy way for me to do this at home?

By: Zed_Lopez

Zed_Lopez — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 08:56:23 -0800

The cheap and easy thing, if you have no use for the rest of the computer and don't care whether you risk breaking it, is to take it apart and remove the hard drive. Buy a USB 2.5" hard drive enclosure (here's one for $10. ) Put the one into the other and plug it into the destination computer.

By: jaimev

jaimev — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 09:00:04 -0800

If you really aren't going to get it fixed, and if you can extract the 2.5" hard drive out of your Powerbook, assuming it's not damaged, then you can probably connect the raw drive to your iMac using a IDE to USB cable.

By: ShawnString

ShawnString — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 09:00:56 -0800

adding to Zed's comments you are in luck that it is the Tibook too. that is THE EASIEST powerbook to work on. take the screws out of the bottom, and the drive just pops out. best of luck with it.

By: ShawnString

ShawnString — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 09:02:11 -0800

oh and another thing, spend the extra cash and get a Firewire enclosure. much faster then usb, and a small FW external drive is REALLY nice to have for back ups. trust me on this.

By: Svenny

Svenny — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 09:05:37 -0800

Having just gone through this myself, I can reccomend the free fixit guides from this site to help you get your laptop opened up.

By: pfuller

pfuller — Tue, 27 Sep 2005 09:25:09 -0800

Thanks for all your help everybody.