Hard drive fell and now isn't working. The drive isn't spinning. I took the IDE out of the case and hooked it up to a hard drive to USB cable adapter but nothing. In device manager it comes up as unknown and I go to add new hardware it says that driver is missing? How can this be. Is there anything I can do? I got 90% of it backed up but there are some pictures that I do want.
In the future what is the best way to back things up?? Drives quit, discs qiut. How do you do it when you have things you just can't loss??
Thanks for your help. I wait for some good news.

As you are referring to an external hard drive that fell on the floor there are two possible causes :
1 - the hard drive connection board and/or cable connection is faulty.
2 - the hard drive itself is faulty.

To check for 1 : hard wire the hard drive directly into your computer, and see if the system recognizes the drive. If not, the drive is faulty.

In that case - and in case 2 - the only way open to recover data is by contacting the hard drive manufacturer and forward the drive as per their arrangement, to get the data recovered against a certain cost.

Success !

:)

I have tried to connect the drive to a hard drive to USB cable adapter and the drive doesn'r spin... I will try to connect the drive internally in my PC.
Does anyone Know approx the $ if I have to send it to the manufacturer??

Price depends on what is wrong with the drive. It normally isn't cheap you have to really want what's on that drive.

As far as back ups go though. Optical discs are your best long term solution. If kept in a good location (away from heat) DVDs should last thousands of years.

In the future what is the best way to back things up???Drives quit, discs qiut. How do you do it when you have things you just can't loss???

Soapbox Disclaimer: Over the years, I've used tape, optical, and removable cartridge based hard and soft disks for backup, and as a result I now despise these products for anything but short term backup due to excessive cost relative to data size to be backed up, backup process complexity and restoration time, short drive life/ongoing drive and media maintenance storage/effort required to have a snowball's chance of getting the data off the backup medium, and ongoing product driver support from the manufacturers.

Personally, I find the fastest, most reliable, easiest (but not cheapest) long term method is using RAID drive arrays for my primary drive instead of a single disc. I have a three drive RAID 5 array in my desktop machine to minimize data loss due to single drive failure and a USB connected external single drive to do weekly or monthly snapshot backups of the array via Acronis TrueImage (http://www.acronis.com) in the unlikely event the array becomes corrupted. You could also do a RAID 1 mirrored array with two drives for less cost at the expense of total storage capacity.

RAID requires a special drive controller which can be either a discrete add-in controller card (Adaptec (http://www.adaptec.com), 3Ware (http://www.3ware.com), Highpoint (http://www.highpoint-tech.com), etc... ) or integrated into the motherboard (Intel (http://www.intel.com), Supermicro (http://www.supermicro.com), Asus (http://www.asus.com), etc... ). I also like putting the whole affair into an internal enclosure (such as this mobile rack (http://www.supermicro.com/products/accessories/mobilerack/CSE-M34S.cfm)) to make drive installation and failed drive replacement easy.

OK I was talking to a lady that is a tech and she said that she "in her last resort, got nothing to loss anyways" hse puts the hard drive in the freezer and sometimes it comes back for one more access. She said that it isn't 100% but it has worked for her. Could this be true. Why the cold if it is? Does anyone else know anymore little tricks...
Yes I am getting desperate... If you told me to stand on my head while I was plugging it in, I would probably try...

Why the cold if it is??

Heat/cold can change physical dimensions of electrical paths enough to restore continuity if hairline cracks, etc. are the reason for failure. Can also work for mechanical "sticktion". A firm tap with a soft hammer has been known to work too.

OK.Hard drive still not working. Found a component burnt on the board. I got a working hard drive,same model,everything. Swapped the boards and it didn't work. Later I learnt that the platter asighs a adderess to he card and flashes it.
OK how do I get the adderess changed. Is there software for this? If I can get around this I'm homefree.