Macbook doesn't recognise it's Hard drive?

Hi,
Have been having real problems with my macbook over last few months. It would not boot up - just went to screen with flashing ? folder. I have inserted the OSX disc and it now starts up from there but when I try and select a disk to install to it shows nothing When I open disk utility it only shows the disc drive and not Hard drive?
Any ideas anyone for what I can do? Or is my Macbook screwed?

As Kappy says, it is almost certain that the hard drive has failed (the other possibility is a failed logic board, which is even worse.)
The good news is it is not difficult to replace the drive. You can either have Apple do it (call whichever phone number on [this page|http://www.apple.com/support/contact/phone_contacts.html] corresponds to your location or carry it in to an Apple store or service provider) or do it yourself. Hard drives are fairly inexpensive and there are directions for the replacement in numerous places on the web.
Do you have back ups of all your important data? If not, you may need to talk to a data recovery outfit such as [DriveSavers|http://www.drivesaversdatarecovery.com> who are usually able to get your data back from even badly damaged hard drives. Be warned, though: they are not cheap.
Best of luck.

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