External Hard drive not working

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Ross Cummings

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Sep 10, 2013
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Hi,
Someone please help

I have a external hard drive which was working with no problems at all... Got asked to take some stuff from an old computer which went ok couple of days later I tried to go back onto the HDD and it was not showing up on "My Computer" ..... so I checked the device manager under disc drives which the HDD showed and when I went into properties it said thedrive was working ok. I have tried changing the USB cable to make sure it was not that, also tried taking HDD out of caddy and putting into a computer which still did not ready the data on it. I have ton of pictures of my wee boy on it which i really dont want to lose.... Can anyone help please?? Cheers
 
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Ross Cummings

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Sep 10, 2013
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Its a USB connection thats on it. If you take it out the casing you can slide out the USB connection and plug it into a sata connection.
 
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goonbar79

goonbar79

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Dec 31, 2008
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What i mean is after bare hdd was removed, did you connect it directly onto your pc mobo sata connector? (you can't do this on a laptop) If no, try that first. If yes, you may be out of luck, as it is very difficult to recover data from undetected hdd without professional service which costs tons of service fee.

If the hdd is not detected directly plugged into the mobo via sata cable, wait for a while (30min~1hr) and try again. Sometimes, the hdd will be detected, and you will have a very short window to pull data out of the unstable hdd. The more you plug/unplug the dying hdd, the more chance that it will die permanently, whether it is the header problem or board.
 
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Ross Cummings

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Sep 10, 2013
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I had gave it to a mate of mine who put it into his computer through the sata cable he was at it for good few hours with no joy....I got it to show up tonight on "My Computer" but it would not let me do anything with it. tried to right click and do a malwarebytes scan on it but it would not do it... looks like it might have to be seen by someone, also thought of getting in contact with western digital as they made it... bit stuck in what to do. Thanks
 
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goonbar79

goonbar79

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Dec 31, 2008
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I don't think manufacturers help users to recover data, so I wouldn't bother with that. What you want to try to do is to get it to show up on Windows even if for a short time so that you can grab the data when you can. DONT do anything OTHER THAN grabbing crucial data when the chance is there, so no malwarebyte scan or any other jobs on that HDD.

Let it rest a bit, and try to plug in sata data cable, and then power, and turn on pc. you must hear it spin (so you know it is getting power). On the desktop, right click my computer -> manage -> disk management to make sure windows sees the drive. Then you can try to go into the drive to retract data. Usually, hdd will die slowly, and users usually can feel that something isn't right, such as clicking noise, or taking a long time when accessing the drive. this will worsen until the hdd cannot be accessed, or "files corrupted" error and such. Once it gets to a certain point, there is no way to recover the data without professional help. Basically, once you notice something is wrong, you shouldn't mess with it too much, as the more you mess with it, the worse its condition will get.

If it is a board problem, you may be able to replace it with an identical model, and get it to work, but chances are not too great as manufacturers don't make the boards interchangeable even for the same model line, and may require additional process to get it "active" with the exchanged part. But if you are desperate, that may be an option.
 
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