WD 1TB My Passport connecting to PC directly

Capitalmind · Jan 23, 2014

Hi all, I have a damaged 1TB drive I wish to plug directly into my PC to try some aggressive data retrieval techniques but I'm not sure how to connect other than I do not want to use the USB. The main connector is 12 pins (6 above the other) and two pins, likely for a jumper (I'm guessing boot setting) on the other side. Please help!

boosted1g · Jan 23, 2014

It sounds like the drive still has some sort of casing/adapter on it.

The pins should only be on one side and look like this (picture is of a 2.5" drive, your drive possibly is the bigger drive, but the power/data connections would be the exact same).
http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/955/wd_scorpio_black_sata.jpg

Now are you using a desktop or a laptop, because most laptops do not have any spare sata ports.

HiTechObsessed · Jan 23, 2014

You can try something like a USB to SATA adapter, like this:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/916859-REG/c2g_30504_usb_2_0_to_sata.html

Unless you're talking about literally hardwiring it in, then you'd have to get someone else to help lol

Capitalmind · Jan 23, 2014

Thank you guys. @Boosted, I took photos of my drive to show you what connections I have and put them on box - https://app.box.com/s/x97gurtwas22vixyj5dm Does this make any more sense? I think it was an early USB3 drive. I had logic errors due to USB3 being poorly supported on my laptop and unmounting the drive too often. I'm trying to carve the drive see if I can salvage documents.

boosted1g · Jan 23, 2014

The silver usb 3.0 plug, is it integrated into the circuit board at the bottom, or is it a sperate piece.

If it is a seperate piece then try to take it off, otherwise try the disk tools from WD website. If the board is all integrated and the disk tools dont work then unfortunatly there is not really anything else you can try

Capitalmind · Jan 23, 2014

I think it's integral. I believe if I try to remove the end, the whole board will come off exposing the discs. It doesn't look like an end cap.

boosted1g · Jan 23, 2014

Ok then, in that case try some of WD disk tools they have on their website, otherwise (shy of hundreds of dollars to have someone remove and obtain the data directly form the disk) you are out of options.

Capitalmind · Jan 24, 2014

boosted1g :

Thank you! I figured I'd lost the data anyway, just thought I could plug it in directly and try some carving tools. Still no idea what connectivity it has, shall shelve this for now.

Dr-Kiev · Jan 24, 2014

If you want то get access to user area, you can solder sata wires like on this picture :
http://www.angeldatarecovery.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/SATAWD10TMVV1-768x1024.jpg
But it won't help you anyhow to extract your files, due this drives use hardware encryption as default option.

Capitalmind · Feb 4, 2014

Thank you Dr-Kiev. Do you know the article link for this, it looks very useful and I may give it a go.

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WD 1TB My Passport connecting to PC directly

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