I dropped my external hard drive one day and i started hearing rattling sound when i plug it. It worked fine for awhile. Now when I plug it..it's detected by the computer, in other words I get that sound and I see the little icon on the task bar. However I cannot see it in my computer or anywhere else. I asked some people and they said it should be a problem with the 'little connector' but im not sure. I have the hard drive in front of me..open and I don't know what to do! Thanks a lot!

I am sorry to hear that. Hard drives have very sensitive moving parts that move require a very high degree of precision and tolerance. As such, they are very susceptible to shock. By the way you describe your problem, it sounds as though there is physical damage to the disk or head. "Rattling" noises of any sort from a hard disc is never good. If there is physical damage, there will be very little you can do yourself I am afraid. There are specialized services that deal with data recovery from physically damaged drives, however they are very expensive.
Here is a link for you if you are interesting in the inner workings of a hard drive. http://www.howstuffworks.com/hard-disk.htm
Good luck,
GaugeMan