Saving files from dying MBP (HD is fine, bad GPU)

[pratiken]

I have a 2008 MBP that is biting the dust. I have a dead nvidia 8600 GPU so I can't get any display. The HD is fine, but the graphics are not.

Before I take it to the store and explore possible repairs (if any, wouldn't be surprised if it's time to buy a new MBP) I want to try to retrieve the data off the HD.

With that, can I take out the HD, put it into an external enclosure and retrieve files from another mac? Can I retrieve them with a PC?

I'm not touching it until I confirm my strategy

Thanks guys.

 

[simsaladimbamba]

You can either take the HDD out and put it into an enclosure for 2.5" SATA drives or you could use Target Disk Mode with any other Mac or Windows computer with a Firewire port.

As for being able to read a Mac formatted HDD on a Windows PC, you need MacDrive (7 day trial will work)or HFSExplorer (free) to do so.

 

[ShadowSKAR]

If you're comfortable working with a minimal GUI, try Clonezilla. Its multiplatform and supports just about any filesystem.

http://clonezilla.org