I was getting this error for a while. I would pull it out, give it a slight shake, then put it back in and it would work. Simply restarting wouldn't do the job. After a couple weeks of this, the shake didn't fix it anymore so I took it inside and opened it up.

All I did was press on the IDE cables at the joints and it worked fine again and haven't had trouble with it for a couple weeks. I believe it does have to do with some constriction due to colder temperatures.