Hard drive crash - looking for data retrieval ideas

[MisterW]

Maxtor 160GB 7200RPM SATA HDD. Computer froze one day and was unable to boot from that drive anymore. It happened a few days after the computer was up and running after moving to a new place, and it has been about a month since I last backed up. There are some new pictures I'd like to rescue, but everything else has been backed up.

Not a huge deal, but it would be nice to get those pictures, so I'm looking for a solution that would let the thing work for like 20 minutes.

So far I've tried making it a slave in another computer, and it is now in a hard drive enclosure. When turned on, it sounds normal for about two seconds, then you hear a soft, rhythmic "click" that repeats about as fast as a heartbeat. Is this the "click of death"?

Also tried jarring it to get things back in place (worked a little longer before clicking again), and I tried freezing the hard drive (literally), which didn't help either (another tech forum recommended this).

Anything else I can try? Also, don't buy Maxtor. They suck. This is the second one that's died on me; the other was only a month old.

Thanks

-MisterW

[kerowo]

Slave, stiction, freezing, drive enclosure, that's pretty much all the cheap stuff. Doesn't sound too good.

[Sotiria]

Stick that bad boy in a freezer for 15-20 minutes inside a plastic bag. Throw it into a working PC and copy pics over quickly...if this works you don't have a lot of time before it locks up again.

[jumbojacks]

You could probably only do this a couple times before you'll need professional help from ontrack, drivesavers, etc.