> > Does anyone have a dead IBM DeskStar Model IC35L040AVER07-0
> > that they would be willing to part with?  I have one that works fine,
> > but some of the pins got bent/pushed in, so I want to see if
> > I can just swap the cards on the drives.  This is on topic as I have
> > all of my Linux files on that drive!

I did a bit of research on IDE pinouts and found that pin 1 (the bent pin) is used to receive a 
reset signal and pin 2 (the one
shoved into the casing) is one of many ground connections.  Feeling confident that these pins 
weren't absolutely necessary for what
I was wanting to do, I decided to try and hook up the drive in question to an IDE controller card 
to see if I could 1) see the drive
and 2) pull data off of it.  When I booted the PC, the expansion IDE controller BIOS correctly 
identified the hard drive.  Once
Gentoo finished booting, I was able to log in as root and mount all of the needed partitions 
successfully.    I was able to pull off
the needed config files, ssh keys, and mail without any problems.  I'm going to see if Hitachi will 
replace the drive since it is
still under warranty.  All I have to lose is $5 for shipping.

Gene