Mac = Dead!

[Drummerrrrr?]

So my MacBook died with a bunch of stuff on it I didn't get a chance to backup. Long story but it died just as I was formatting my backup drive to sync properly with Time Machine, can't fix it now.
So I think the HDD in the MacBook is dead, I can't boot into OSX anymore, it just hangs at the apple logo. Wondering if I take it to a local tech or if I send it to Apple and see if they can possibly save any of my data and maybe refurbish it as well. Thoughts?

 

[Lasse Lammert]

hangs at the grey screen?
could be anything, ram, mainboard...
check with the Hardware Test (came with your mac).

Can you boot from the DVD?

 

[LydonB]

Apple doesn't do any data recovery. If it is out of warranty, buy a new drive and install it yourself. Buy a sled and try to get the data off that way.

 

[sprack]

Will it boot in single user mode, hold down Apple-S right after you turn it on?

 

[Sloan]

There's a radass program for PC that you can check drives that have messed up boot records and stuff, maybe that will work?

 

[SimonSez]

Try taking it to the Apple store if there's one near you. My friend had a hard drive that failed to boot on his Macbook Pro, and it was out of warranty and they fixed it anyway for free and it took them one day to do it. The only thing is they said he had to backup his software on his own, so I helped him out with that.