How to connect a laptop hard drive to a desktop computer
To connect a laptop hard drive to a desktop computer you have to use a Laptop IDE Hard Drive Adapter. You can easily find this adapter on the Internet for $10-$15. This adapter is very handy if you want to scan a laptop hard drive for viruses and spyware using antivirus software installed on a desktop PC, transfer data from a laptop hard drive to a desktop computer or create a ghost image from one hard drive to another. I also use this adapter if a laptop hard drive has failed and I have to recover data from it.
When you connect a laptop IDE adapter, a desktop IDE cable and a laptop hard drive to each other, make sure to connect pin 1 on the hard drive, pin 1 on the desktop IDE cable to pin 1 on the adapter. On a desktop IDE cable the side painted in red goes to pin 1.
On a laptop hard drive there are 2 groups of pins. One group has 43 pins and the other has 4 pins. The pin 1 is located on the side closer to the group of 4 pins.
After you’ve assembled everything together, connect the IDE cable to a desktop PC. Connect it to a free IDE connector on the system board. When you start the computer, you should see the laptop drive in BIOS and in Windows. You can treat this drive as a regular hard drive.
Entry Filed under: Laptop Tips and Tricks
84 Responses to “How to connect a laptop hard drive to a desktop computer”
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Pages: « 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 [1] Show All
May 1st, 2006 at 11:16 pm
Drew,
Make sure if the laptop hard drive is the only drive attached to the ribbon cable. It shouldn’t matter what cable you use. Make sure that you plugged the hard drive correctly. If you connected everything correctly, you should feel that the hard drive start spinning when you turn on the computer. If it doesn’t spin then most likely it’s dead. It is also possible that your hard drive IDE connector is bad.
You can also try to buy a USB enclosure, just to make sure. It’s about $20-25. You put the hard drive inside and connect to the computer via USB cable.
Your last chance is a clean room recover – VEEEEEERY Expensive! I’m not sure if then can get data from a hard drive that doesn’t spin, it depends on how bad it’s damaged.
May 1st, 2006 at 8:50 pm
Hi, I attached a destop cable (that was initially attached to a CDROM drive) to an adapter holding a laptor HDD. Nothing pops up anywhere…
I’m wondering if my HDD is dead? or if i can’t use a cable that was attached to a CDROM drive?? it seems like a valid option, just nothing pops up indicating an additional hard drive is found..
if my laptop HDD is dead, is there ANYWAY i can restore the data? please help
April 17th, 2006 at 5:43 am
I have a toshy m 30 s 309
it wont boot up to win xp. has a grey stripped screen image and flashes through a blue scree,
sees but does not run the CD/DVD, maybe needs a Bios update. but how do I do that with nil access to it.
maybe your adapter is the go?
please help out. do you know the toshibas faults in this area?
April 3rd, 2006 at 6:27 am
Hi Brad,
You definitely can remove the cracked LCD screen from the laptop and use it as a desktop. Here is my Toshiba Satellite A15 disassembly guide. This guide shows how to remove the system board. You can use the guide to remove the display and top cover assembly. After that you have to separate the display assembly from the top cover.
After STEP 18 you have to proceed on your own.
April 3rd, 2006 at 3:29 am
I have an A15 satellite with a cracked LCD and use it with an external monitor, my question is this, is there a way to remove the LCD from the unit and not affect it functioning?
March 24th, 2006 at 1:30 pm
Hey guys,
I experience the same problem with one of mine HDD enclosures.
I have 2 enclosures. For first one I paid about $25-30 and the brand name is Mapower (I bought in on newegg). This enclosure is very solid and works perfect with all laptop hard drive I put in. The only thing I do not like, you have to disassemble the enclosure completely to put in the hard drive. I often use the enclosure for data recovery and need an easy access to the connector. For this reason I recently bough the second HDD enclosure. The second one is cheaper $15-18 (the brand name is Hotdrive), but it gives you much easier access to the hard drive, you just have to remove 2 screws. The second enclosure will not work properly with some hard drives. Sometimes I’m getting BSOD when I connect it, sometimes the USB device is detected but the HDD will not show up in Windows and sometimes it works just fine. I guess it is not just compatible with some hard drives. So, when you buy an enclosure, do not buy a cheap one and read reviews from other users.
March 23rd, 2006 at 4:18 am
I got a Toshiba MK3017GAP HDD from a damaged laptop and put it into an enclosure, it spins up, but it’s not recognised in my computer. I can see it as a USB device in device manager and was wondering if the four pins need jumpers to make it work. Any ideas what I could try?
Any help appreciated.
March 15th, 2006 at 5:56 am
hi i’ve bought one of these adaptors but when i’ve attached the drive to my desktop it says my laptop drive isnt formatted when i know it has. Both machines were running XP Pro, and ideas??
Would really appreciate any help.
Cheers
February 23rd, 2006 at 8:12 am
Most likely you have a SATA hard drive and it does not have regular IDE pins. SATA drives have 2 flat connectors, one for power and one for data. If your desktop computer supports SATA drives and it has SATA connectors on the system board, you can connect it directly to the system board using SATA cables. If the system board does not support SATA hard drives by default, you can by a SATA PCI controller card. You install this card into an empty PCI slot on the system board and connect the SATA drive directly to the controller card with SATA cables. After you boot the PC you should see the laptop SATA hard drive as a regular drive on your PC.
February 23rd, 2006 at 4:16 am
i have the HDD out of my M45-S359… but i cannot put it in my enclosure, or connect it to an adapter. I need help. The IDE pins aren’t there. What can i do?