A drive vibrating as though working normally but not appearing in the system at all, leaving the client unable to reach any files. The mechanics were sound. The fault was in the drive's own firmware.
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The client's description — vibrating as if working, but not appearing in the menu — is one of the more useful symptom reports we receive, because it separates two things that usually go together.
The drive was spinning. That means the motor, the spindle and the power path were all functioning. And yet the machine could not see it, which means the drive was not completing the process of identifying itself.
This is firmware territory. Every hard drive boots from code held in a reserved area of its own platters, called the service area, loading modules that describe its geometry, its defect map and its calibration. If those modules cannot be read or have become inconsistent, the drive spins perfectly and never reports itself correctly to the host.
No software running on the client's computer can address this, because the computer cannot see the drive to run anything against it. The work happens at drive level, through a manufacturer engineering interface.
The data was copied off following the firmware correction. No clean-air work, no donor parts and no mechanical intervention were required.
Firmware faults are among the most misdiagnosed failures in this field, because the drive sounds healthy. People reasonably conclude that a drive spinning normally must be fine and that the problem is the computer, and they spend time on cables, ports and drivers.
A drive that sounds perfectly normal and never appears is failing at identification, not at rotation. That is a firmware fault, not a connection problem.
Recovery software needs a device to work against. Where the drive never identifies itself, there is nothing for any tool on your computer to address.
Firmware faults leave the platters and heads untouched. Once the drive is talking again, imaging usually proceeds normally.