How to Fix a Broken Hard Drive (& Should You DIY It?)

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Computer Specialist Luigi Oppido explains your best options for fixing a broken hard drive

Co-authored by Luigi Oppido and Nicole Levine, MFA

Last Updated: August 16, 2026 Fact Checked

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• Verify Physical Damage
|
• Get Professional Repair
|
• Repair it Yourself
|
• How Can You Fix a Physically Broken Hard Drive?
|
• Video
|
• Q&A

|Show more |Show less

While it's merely an inconvenience when your computer crashes, it's an absolute disaster when your hard drive dies. A dead hard drive usually means your data is destroyed–unless you backed it up, of course. But is your drive really dead, or just mostly dead? We'll show you how to determine whether your hard drive is physically broken, and explain your options for fixing it. We also spoke to computer and tech specialist Luigi Oppido about the risks of DIY repair, and when it's worth paying for a professional repair service.

Can you repair a damaged hard drive?

Computer Specialist Luigi Oppido says if the drive is physically broken, you need a professional data recovery service with a clean room(s) and specialized equipment to fix it and recover your data. Depending on the drive and what's stored on it, it may not be worth the cost, as repair and data recovery can top $1000.

Steps

Section 1 of 3:

Verify Physical Damage

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1. 
   1
   Listen for sounds of physical damage. Oppido explains that if the hard drive is physically broken, you will likely hear clicking or grinding sounds when you try to access data on it, or you may not hear it spin up at all. If the drive spins up and isn't making weird noises, it may not be physically damaged.

   • If you hear signs of physical damage, jump to your repair options.
2. 
   2
   Check hardware connections. If you don't hear your hard drive spinning up, or it's just not being detected, make sure the drive itself is properly connected to your computer. If it's an external drive, try using a different USB cable to connect it. If it's an internal hard drive, open your computer, and ensure all cables are securely connected. Make sure they are seated well, and no pins are bent, broken, or otherwise damaged.
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3. 
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   Physically test the drive. Hold the drive in one hand and firmly spin it back and forth, listening for any noises as you do so. This may seem like "not doing anything", but actually, if anything is loose, you may cause it to break!!! If you can't hear any noises, a likely cause—especially if you have an older drive, or one which ran very hot to the touch—is a seized head bearing or spindle. If you open up the drive, you are likely to kill whatever was still able to be saved.

   • Oppido recommends hooking the drive up to another functional computer that's running its own operating system to see if that computer detects it.
4. 
   4
   Do a visual check inside the computer. Sometimes, it's not the drive that's dead, but the PC board that controls its operation (on the underside of the drive). If there's a power surge or a component failure on that board, your hard drive will stop working, but only because it doesn't know what to do next.

   • If you see burns or scorch marks, you may be able to fix the hard drive yourself by replacing the printed circuit board (PCB). You can breathe a little sigh of relief, for it means the issue can be easily fixed by replacing the PCB. Jump to Repair it Yourself to learn how.
5. 
   5
   Check to see if the drive is being recognized. If everything is plugged in and nothing appears to have blown up on the controller PCB, the issue may not be physical. You can use built-in tools like Windows Disk Management or BIOS, or Mac OS Disk Utility to determine if your drive is being recognized at all.

   • Some tools you can use to check the health of your hard drive:
     • CHKDSK
     • Creating a system diagnostic report in Performance Monitor:
       • Open Performance Monitor and go to Data Collector Sets > System.
       • Right-click "System Diagnostics" and select Start.
       • Go to Reports > System > System Diagnostics and select the diagnostic report.
       • If the disk check report and SMART tests pass, the drive is not dead.
   • Oppido warns that if you try to run software on a physically damaged drive, you risk making the damage worse and losing the data permanently.
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Section 2 of 3:

Get Professional Repair

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1. 
   Hiring a professional hard drive repair or data recovery service is the ONLY safe option to get your drive back up and running. If the data is that important, Oppido stresses the importance of paying for a data recovery specialist. "A specialist data recovery suite will disassemble the drive, remove the disks inside, and put them into a functional drive," he explains. While cost can be an issue–Oppido says the price could even start around $1000–it's worth it if the data is important to you.

   • Get recommendations. Before plunking down any cash, check the service's credentials. Look at online user forums, talk to them, and find out how long they've been in business and what their recovery percentage is.
   • Check the guarantee. How much is it worth to you for them to make a failed attempt? Oppido notes that many recovery specialists have a "we can't fix, you don't pay" policy, which means you'll have to pay for their services even if they aren't able to fix the drive enough to recover your data. Try to find a service without a guarantee to avoid these charges.
     • You may not want to pay for a recovery that didn't happen, but if they attempted to repair and if it failed, they still spent some amount of time trying, which should be compensated.

Section 3 of 3:

Repair it Yourself

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1. 
   1
   Consider professional repair if at all possible. If you attempt to fix the drive yourself and are unsuccessful, which is highly likely if you're not a professional, you'll make the problem worse. Do not attempt self-repair if the data is important to you. Some of these techniques are "Hail Mary" attempts that will either work or render your drive truly, finally, really dead, and not even recoverable by professionals. This will totally and finally kill any part of the data that is not already damaged.

   • Oppido says that if the data is worth saving, it is worth finding a professional hard-drive recovery company and paying what it takes to get your data back.
   • If your drive made a clicking or grinding sound, any time you plug it in again causes loss of data by damaging the magnetic layer on the drive.
2. 
   2
   Replace the PCB. If you saw burns or scorch marks when you visually inspected the drive, you may be able to repair it by replacing the PCB–the computer board on the bottom of the drive. This is a fairly easy fix that, even if the problem winds up not being the PCB, won't make your problems any worse.

   • First, search on Google for replacement parts for your drive's make and model. Order the PCB, which may be listed as a "control board" or "circuit board.
   • When it arrives, remove the old board (there are five tiny screws to remove—don't lose them!)
   • Slide out the old drive and replace it with the new one. Do not touch the metal leads on the new board; static discharge could blow your new board before it ever has a chance to breathe new life into your drive. You can ground yourself by wearing an anti-static wrist band or by touching something grounded and metal. The inside of your plugged-in computer usually works.
   • Slide in the new board, making sure it's seated firmly into the drive, then reattach the screws.
   • Reconnect the drive to the computer, then power back up. If it works, congratulations! It's a good idea to back up your data at this point, but you're ready to go.
3. 
   3
   Freeze the hard drive. One controversial repair option is freezing the drive, which is only likely to work on a much older hard drive–it's actually extremely risky on a newer hard drive or SSD, so you should only try this on vintage hardware. If this happens to work, you may only get the drive back long enough to copy off important files, but if all else fails and you don't care about recovering the data, it's worth a try.

   • Seal the drive in a zip-lock bag, and remove as much air as possible. Pop the drive into the freezer for a few hours.
   • Plug the drive back into the computer and give it a try. If it doesn't work immediately, power down, remove the drive, then smack it on a hard surface such as a table or floor. Re-attach the drive, and try again. If it works, save your files, then toss the drive. If it doesn't, your drive will now be beyond all methods of professional help!
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How Can You Fix a Physically Broken Hard Drive?

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• Question

  What should I do to fix an external hard disc connector problem?

  

  Community Answer

  An external hard drive is just a regular internal hard drive in an external case. You can open the case and take out the drive, and from here you can connect it to a computer in a number of different ways. Or you can find a replacement case and install the hard drive so you again have a functioning external hard drive.

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• Question

  How do I repair a laptop hard drive?

  

  Community Answer

  Most laptop hard drives are similar or the same basic structure of a desktop hard drive, and will require you to take it to a repair shop or follow the above steps.

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  How do I retrieve files and data from a broken hard drive?

  

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  There are "data recovery services" that will disassemble your hard drive and do magic to the magnetic medium to recover as much information as possible. But they cost a lot of money. I might send an email to grc.com and ask them for a referral to a reputable data recovery service. At least you'll want to spend your money (and protect your privacy) on a company that has high customer satisfaction ratings.

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