I've had a external hard drive for awhile now but I knocked off my desk and the usb port broke. I've completely taken the casing off and its just the hard drive itself and the bottom portion (not sure what its called). I was wondering if I could just bypass the smaller part and just directly plug it into my computer and if not will soldering the piece back fix it?
Plugging the hard drive into your computer using a sata cable will work as long as the drive wasn't damaged. And if in the 4th pic the usb port is soldered on there why haven't you tested it?
[quote name='"overheatedmud"']Plugging the hard drive into your computer using a sata cable will work as long as the drive wasn't damaged. And if in the 4th pic the usb port is soldered on there why haven't you tested it?[/quote] Cool thats what I was hoping for, I got some extra sata cables and in the pic I just have it sitting on there.Thanks for the help.
A circuit board is a very delicate thing, it's usually layers upon layers of wiring, so if you want to soldered it you've got to know if the wiring hasn't been damaged. If you do it wrong, there's a good chance you might fry some other part of the circuit. Also one slip and you've got metal in the wrong crack and you won't be able to fix anything. I wouldn't bother with it. The HDD should be good to go if you grab a working SATA cable and plug it onto you mobo though