I have a 13 GB Western Digital IDE hard drive, manufactured in 2000. Last
week I noticed a clicking sound when starting up the PC, and it turns out
it's the hard drive, which is still recognized by the motherboard (most of
the time), but isn't bootable....the drive clicks, I hear it spinning, then
about 20 seconds later it clicks again and spins once more ( by that I mean
the rapid clicka-clicka-clicka of a healthy drive), almost like it's a car
trying to warm up. It never boots however.

I've gone into DOS and tried moving the contents to another drive, but have
had no luck. DOS won't recognize the drive any longer.

I know it's probably too late for this thing, but are there any tricks that
might buy me an hour, just long enough to pull my files off? I've tried
holding it in various positions (vertical, horizontal) when starting up my
PC, but that didn't help, though it clicked less in some positions than
others.

I'm willing to open the drive if there were some good that could come out of
it, though I'd have to think that would simply put a final nail in the
coffin. If you know of any home remedies that might extend the life even a
bit, I'd love to hear them. Thanks.

-Jim