Hard drives data backup?

I just wanted to make a couple of my old laptops fit for my friends, so far everything has worked except for a few broken ram bars or something.

Now I have found a laptop that is very slow (it takes 20 minutes to boot up etc.).

I suspect the hard drive is broken I have already removed it but wanted to look at the data again. And it is just too slow for that and before the statement comes out it is worth repairing it - it was a very modern end-of-life laptop a few years ago.

Now to my question:

Can I use the old hard drive on which windwos is installed! Simply connect to my PC via sata and read the data WITHOUT booting on this hard drive? So only evaluate this hard drive as a second data medium without the windwos problem?

Should work…
I would use Linux (e.g. Knoppix) with ddrescue…
http://knoppix.net/
https://www.gnu.org/software/ddrescue/
there's also a GUI: ddrescue-gui
https://www.hamishmb.com/html/downloads.php?program_name=ddrescue-gui
by the way, this is also possible for Windoze… LOL

Can I simply install the tool on windows and then have the hard drive secured
(Don't feel like putting on a digital Linux PC now) 😂

Sure… Ddrescue-gui also works with Windoze… But be careful that you use the right download link… Somewhere below (where "Windows" is): https://www.hamishmb.com/html/downloads.php?program_name=ddrescue-gui