Recovering files from harddrive

My laptop got broken (by what it seems the graphics card burned) and it is so old that it is not worth fixing it.

I took the harddrive from it and tried to use it as external hard drive with other computer, however I cannot access all the data, ie anything that is inside my user folder (it shows it to be empty). Couldn't find anything to solve it.

Solution 1:

I cannot access all the data

You need to take ownership of the files/directories on the hard drive.

The following assumes you are using windows (and should work for versions other than Windows 8).

Note:

• Do not take ownership of C:\.

  Doing so, could result in Windows 8 becoming very unstable.

Take Ownership of an Object using TAKEOWN Command

This command will take ownership of the folder or drive, and all files and subfolders in the folder or drive.

Open an elevated command prompt.

To grant ownership to currently logged on user:

takeown /F "full path of folder or drive" /R /D Y

To grant ownership to the administrators group:

takeown /F "full path of folder or drive" /A /R /D Y

Examples:

takeown /F "F:" /A /R /D Y
takeown /F "F:\Folder" /A /R /D Y

Take Ownership of a Folder or Drive and All Contents using ICALCS Command

Open an elevated command prompt.

To set any user as owner:

icacls "full path of folder or drive" /setowner "user name" /T /C

To set administrators group as owner:

icacls "full path of folder or drive" /setowner "Administrators" /T /C

Example:

icacls "C:\Windows\Folder" /setowner "Administrators" /T /C

Source Take Ownership of a File, Folder, Drive, or Registry Key in Windows 8