W510: How to access my data from a functional hard drive after motherboard failure

I made a mistake and paid the major price .
That mistake being spilling a sugary drink on my laptop. I know, I know, my keyboard can and protect against damage from spills, but it was an entire glass. Anyway, I panicked and shut the system down and turned it upside down and removed the keyboard. And being the impatient person I am, I made what was probably the ultimate mistake. I didn't give everything adequate amount of time to dry and tried booting the system back up. There went my computer. Or at least I think.
Symptoms: It started to bootup, kept beeping, then at a certain point just shut down and wouldn't turn back on.
Anyway, I'm assuming my laptop went kaput. Now to the point of this thread. I had not undergone a recent backup and can't recall when the last backup was actually done. Assuming that my hard drive is ok, I would like to get all of my data so I saw several possible options:
-send the system to a data recovery service where I'm not going to pay below $300, but probably 2 to 3 times that
-buy an equivalent model laptop and put the HDD in there
-by an external SATA hard drive enclosure and attach it via USB to another computer
I bought an external enclosure and assembled it this evening. I had read about difficulty accessing data with a non-Lenovo system because of data encryption. I proved that out by attaching it to my work laptop (a Dell) and I couldn't access my data directories. If I have access to another Lenovo Thinkpad, will I be able to access the data if connected via USB? I'd read that I can access the hard drive contents if it is connected to another Thinkpad, but I wasn't sure if that means I have to have it interfaced via the SATA connection or if it will still work via USB.
I'll appreciate any suggestions for accessing my data.
Best Regards!
Solved!
Go to Solution.

I didn't have a password on the drive itself, but I did have a Windows password.
Connecting the drive to a Dell via SATA external usb enclosure and attempting to access the data directory gives the below prompt (See image below). I understand that I could click continue and try to gain permanent access, but I haven't attemped yet because I also don't want to permanently mess something up so that I can't access.
So this was connected to my work computer, which is a Dell. I do have access to another Thinkpad (X200 series tablet) with the same results. I'm concerned that if I do follow the steps to gain permission to the folder that the data will also be encrypted. I read at this Lenovo link http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/research/hints-or-tips/detail.page?&LegacyDocID=MIGR-69621 about full data encryption. I don't recall ever manually setting up encryption.
Alternatively, could I boot from the old drive using the X200?
Any help appreciated.
Thanks again.

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