something similar happened to me.. a friend gave me his portable hard drive so i could get some tv shows and stuff off him... and somehow, the logic board on the hard drive got fried.. i dunno if it was a power surge or something or what :S.. i havent told him yet... hopefully there was nothing too important on there.. or he at least has back ups.. i went looking for the same hard drive so i could swap logic boards, but wouldn't you know, in the 3 months since he has bought it, they've changed the board... grrrrrr