We have two hard drives on our computer...our second one (not having Windows on it) we used to store all of our pictures - from the last three or four years!!  All of a sudden it's no longer available - what can I do???  This is really freaking me out!

I BUILT the computer a few years ago, so I know a little bit - just have to refresh my memory - but the hard DRIVE is still plugged in!

Thanks,
~AnnieAlright...well I feel like a dufus...I trusted my dear husband when he said it was connected...it wasn't.  So it's working now!  I think I'm gonna find some DVDs to back up those pictures...it was too scary to think they were GONE forever!Good that it HAPPENED this way and you still have your photo's...hard drives aren't the best place for valuable data.

What backup software are you using/considering ? ?This thread reminds me of my situation so I thought I'd post it here.
I had an older machine that suddenly quit working. I belive it was a main board problem because I got power to the machine but the only thing it did was run the fans. I couldn't get into bios and the o/s wouldn't load. So I borrowed an old machine from a friend which was running win 98 and stuck my hdd in it as a slave to try to salvage some files. My Old o/s was XP pro.
Well it worked and I was able to access my hdd. However, to make matters intriguing Because I had originallly partitioned my hdd into 3 partitiions, I couldn't access some of the files on the c drive. Well to make a long story short, I picked up a used HP Pavillion with a hdd of it's own running XP home, stuck my old hdd into it as a slave and it still works but with the same problem. So my question is this; Is there anyway to access those files on my old c drive (now the D drive) that has the other o/s on it.
Note: I cannot seem to get the machine to boot to that hdd. when I configure bios to do that and restart, tyhe thing just sits there with a blank screen. Also, I had the old o/s set up with me as the administrater and other users with their own desktops and files (like docs and pics) I can access those other files but not mine. What Up?Always better to start your own topic, but have a read here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308421