Quote Originally Posted by Funkstar View Post
have you tried the disks in a PC?

could it be the xbox controllers that are fried, not the drives?
Drives will spin up with no sata/ide host attached. Either the drives are fryed, or they are not getting power (or atleast not getting the correct power)

Things like this happen in pc's too, although usually without the smell. If there was really smell you should check all the pcb's for damage. Most likely a burnt/exploded IC or leaking capacitor, or a short somewhere.