Arem.us IDE Pin Fix

Arem.us IDE Pin Fix

Intro:

If you've ever broken the pin off of an IDE drive, you know what an absolute horror that is. Especially if you're like me and you don't back up quite like you should. Well, a couple years ago I found myself in that position. But rather than give up, I was determined to get my files back. Here's what I did.

It's a little hard to see in the picture, but the bottom left pin in the main IDE bank there is snapped right off.

Parts/Tools Required:

IDE drive with broken pin. Please don't break one just to see if this works.
Sewing needle or pin.
Tin foil.
Wire cutters.
IDE Cable.

Prepping the Hard Drive:

Basically, all you need to do is to get an electrical connection between that little stub where the pin used to be and the IDE cable. So, the first thing to do is to fashion something that will contact the pin stub better than the hole on the cable. I cut out a tiny piece of tin foil, folded it over 2 or 3 times and set it on top of where the pin used to be, being careful that it didn't touch any other pins. Don't wanna short circuit the sucker.

Prepping the Cable:

Now you need to add something to the cable that will contact the tin foil better than the hole on the connector there. I stuck a sewing pin in as far as it would go and then snipped it off with wire cutters, leaving about 1/8th of an inch or so extra.

Success:

Then I just hooked it back up! The sewing pin touches the tin foil which touches the broken off pin on the hard drive and the connection is made. I don't know how trustworth this really is, but I used it for months this way with no issues whatsoever. (The pin I broke was non-crucial and the drive worked fine in windows safe mode. Because of that, I knew I could always get the data off if my little hack failed. Please be really careful what you do with this.) And the best part was that I rescued my data (instead of paying somebody a load of money to do it) and saved $100 by not buying a new drive.