This problem is pretty common for hard drives manufactured by Seagate, Maxtor and Toshiba (less commonly – Hitachi). Drive’s spindle will not spin up making a distinctive buzzing or humming sound on power-up. Stuck Maxtor drives are even performing weird tunes, so-called “dead Maxtor song”. The reason for drive’s spindle being stuck is either bent/damaged axis or partial destruction of sleeve bearing. Usually drives don’t get stuck by themselves but due to some mechanical impact (even a minor shock). Anyways the fact that some drives are significantly more subject to spindle seizure than others indicates flaws in motor design, they are simply not enough “shock-proof”. Drive affected by seized motor problem is not registered in computer’s OS and not visible in the BIOS. Data recovery from seized spindle drives is usually performed by replanting magnetic platters from original drive onto compatible donor drive. Our success rate for such recovery jobs is at least 95%. Clean room required.