Click of death on Hitachi 1TB drive...

I have a 1TB Hitachi drive:
HDT721010SLA360

It's giving me the click of death and won't show up in the BIOS.

Could a backplane replacement help? Would the fact that it won't show up in the BIOS indicate a backplane issue and less likely problem with the actual heads? I don't want to just go and buy one just to see, I've done backplane replacements before but the drives didn't have the click of death.

Freezing will be something I explore as a last option as I think it's more of a wives tale than anything else.

Thanks,
Aaron

Freezing is only to get the platters spinning in an absolute last case scenario. If it is clicking, that isn't the case, so don't bother.

If the drive is clicking and not showing up in the BIOS, that makes sense. It can't initialize and report back to the motherboard in time, so the SATA controller on your motherboard ignores it. I doubt replacing the logic board on the drive will fix it. Getting a replacement board will likely cost as much or more than the drive itself anyway.

Unless you need data off it, don't bother trying to fix it.

Backplane replacement? Wouldn't it be more reasonable to first try something completely different, a circuit board replacement, including BIOS chip transplant (OnePCBsolution.com, etc., offer that)?

If you try the freezer trick, put the drive in an anti-static bag and completely seal it to make it airtight because the heads are in a dust-proof chamber, not a moisture-proof chamber. And when you take the drive out of the freezer (refrigerator is safer), don't open the bag until the coldest part of the drive exceeds the dew point of the room air.

The freezer trick won't help unless there's a cracked solder joint that gets temporarily fixed through temperature contraction or expansion. Freezing or refrigerating drives is only for ancient models with no servo tracks to automatically compensate for expansion of the platters.

That's interesting, I thought freezing help contract stuck bearing's.