Comments on: What Can You Do with a Dead Hard Drive?

By: Joseph Ryan

Joseph Ryan — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 21:29:22 +0000

You didn’t mention where to get the especially small hex drivers or any other tools that you need to non destructively disassemble the drives and the platters, magnets and other goodies out. Perhaps that is a different topic. Definitely interesting topic for a how-to slide-show or video.

Besides all these suggestions you did not mention my favorite use for old drives – even those that are not dead but merely in hibernation (I have to keep old data until contracts are fulfilled). They make excellent bookends!

Thanks

By: wowpcs

wowpcs — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 07:34:11 +0000

What Can You Do with a Dead Hard Drive?

1Fix it
2 Sale It
3Gaveitway

By: Cliffystones

Cliffystones — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 14:15:06 +0000

The magnets come in handy for holding tools and small parts/screws in the shop, holding up documents/diagrams/etc. while I’m working on a piece of equipment.

Those platters are great to put in your hiking backpack for emergency signaling mirrors. They’re very shiny and completely unbreakable.

By: Lizzy

Lizzy — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:47:28 +0000

I have a stack of dead hard drives. I love those ideas!

By: JawnyG

JawnyG — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:17:26 +0000

If you have SpinRite, or a friend with a copy, try that before you hammer the drive! If you were able to access the drive to copy things off… it sounds EXACTLY the kind of thing that SpinRite would fix. I didn’t believe it either, but it worked for me on a “dead drive”. You may end up with an extra usable drive.

I mean, I would have taken it in for replacement too, if it was under warranty. BUT! I would have asked to keep the disk as you did, and run spinrite as soon as I got home! LOL! New drive, and your get a old drive to use as well. “Cake, and Eat it TOO!”

~JawnyG

By: FritzThird

FritzThird — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:46:59 +0000

Or you could make a hard drive speaker system:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Hard-Drive-Speaker-System/

By: Pouros

Pouros — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 11:10:15 +0000

Hey all

You could try and make a cool lamp out of it.
With lot’s of pretty lights and neon :D like that google cube you showed a while ago. You could also built a radio or clock with it, or even a combo of all 3.

Maybe you could somehow make it propell itself, or
you could also remove the disk and head and put stuff ontop of it, then speed it and see what happends.

If that fails I suggest you go up on your roof and slingshot it as far as you can ^^.

By: dede

dede — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 21:51:59 +0000

you could make a tesla turbine or a siren >:D good for annoying the neighbors

By: Kinkajou

Kinkajou — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 17:23:17 +0000

I need more hard drives to take apart, hopefully I can get about a dozen dead drives then I’ll have enough platters to make the mirror. So far from two old dead drives I got 4 platters and 3 magnets, and one case that I can use as a storage box. I need to take the motherboard out of my old PC, I’m going to use that as the backing for the mirror if I ever get to it.

By: neopugg

neopugg — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 12:07:12 +0000

If you got 100 dead hard drives: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YocnQ0NMTUA

By: Eddie Thieda

Eddie Thieda — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 11:40:09 +0000

Thanks for the all-in-one package deal, Chris.

I am going to bookmark this for when a hard drive dies on me sometime (never I hope).

By: JRela2000

JRela2000 — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 09:31:02 +0000

Sounds neat. Need pictures to bring the visuals home. I have no idea what the platters look like….

By: George

George — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 09:08:26 +0000

Or, hook the motor up to an Arduino board and go nuts: http://tinyurl.com/dy8×6m

By: Sonny Dickson

Sonny Dickson — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 08:31:44 +0000

Good Job Chris