HDD "Crash"

I have an e-acquaintance who has dropped
a portable HDD. It's now unreadable. Many
years of pic files were on it, on there way
to another PC. It was dropped in transit.

Were they copied files? Ulp?! No. They
were moved files. (The wisdom of hindsight!)
(T'was a 500Gb HDD)

Supposedly, the drop has buggered the
bearings. Quotes for data recovery attempts
are circa $NZ1500. He's abandoned the
idea, as he's a sickness beneficiary and
that's so far out of his price league.

Is it really likely to be that bad? Or are
there other options available? Anyone
got any clues?

Perry