Hi redvert:
Just like to add a short list of possible "gotchas" on the suggestion link from Mike and Bass. If you decide to try and unlock and or reformat your old hard drive:
1.) Creating the ULTIMATE BOOT CD is not for beginners or those with no patience. It's an advanced tool for power-users, and it's a linux-based toolset, and therefore not easy to create. If you have tried it and it didn't work, don't be surprised. It took me 2 weeks of effort to figure it out, and I've been doing computers for 40+ yrs. I would suggest that you borrow one from your local Computer Pro if possible. It's completely free, so he should be willing to make you a copy of the disc. Or let you use it for a week, and then return it when you're done. If it's his only copy, he probably won't let you borrow it unless he can make you a copy. I use that to run my computer repair business, and I have multiple copies as you can imagine.
2.) I suggest you use the IMGBURN program instead of the PowerISO or MagicISO programs to create your UBCD live boot cd. I tried both of those programs for many hours and they did not work for this particular application.
3.) Once you buy a "drive caddy" as we like to call them; that's the little device that connects your old hard drive to another computer; and you are attempting to use "Derek's Boot & Nuke" program mentioned in Mike's linked article, make very sure NOT to use the AUTONUKE option!! It's been years since I used this option and last week while wiping a Customers hard drive from a broken computer, I hit that option and it erased both my Vista boot drive (C: drive) and my 2nd hard drive with a Win8.1 setup on it!!! Both of those were completely unrecoverable after that. It's taken me a week of working night & day to rebuild my Vista computer *Dell Studio540* and I had pretty good backups of the data. I haven't even gotten around to rebuilding my Win8.1 drive yet. Make sure you select the INTERACTIVE AUTOBAN, or MANUAL WIPE options. If you attempt the drive wipe on your old hard drive and it fails, don't take the last option, the AUTONUKE option, as it is only intended to wipe the internal drives on the computer you are using to attach to your old drive via a USB connection through the drive caddy. Instead, take the old hard drive and hook up to a difference computer desktop or laptop using the drive caddy and try again; using the Interactive or Manual options only! If it still fails, the hard drive is probably toast. If you are able to wipe it, and you put it back into your laptop or a different computer there is still a possibility it can be repurposed if Windows will install on it. If none of this makes any sense to you, I suggest you leave this to the professional you mentioned you had access to in Ohio I think it was.
4.) Lastly, if you do download and use the IMGBURN program on a Windows7 computer to burn your UBCD disk, ensure that you remove it IMMEDIATELY from that Windows7 computer after you've created your new UBCD disk. If you don't and you leave it on there, you will start to get crashes and BSODs (Blue Screens Of Death). It took me 8 months or more to figure out that this little cd burning program (Freeware) was causing all of my crash problems on my main PC! Thankfully, folks here on Windows Forums helped me to nail down the offending App--in this case the IMGBURN program. It's a great little program, but, it doesn't seem to like Windows7, and I have sent a note to the developers, but they have yet to fix it! This is part of the risk of using complex tools that are developed by various folks on the Internet. Most do a very good job at what they claim to do, and if they are virus-free of course that's a help, but it's one of the pitfalls of our business.
If you decide to venture into the DIY world of computer repair, and more specifically, hard drive repair, these are a few things you have to watch out for. I've worked for 4 hard drive manufacturers during my career, and I understand the inner workings more than most, and I STILL have problems every so often, as I attest to above <blushing>.
If this puts you off from trying it yourself, you can still give to your friend in Ohio to unlock/wipe that drive for you for a small fee. And you don't have to deal with all the caveats I've listed above.
Best,
BIGBEARJEDI