External to Internal HDD problems

Psyckosama · Jul 28, 2014

One of my USB2 externals just went belly up and I'm trying to recover the contents. To do this I've hooked it up to my computer as an internal SATA drive. The problem is that windows isn't recognizing it and in Disc Management its listed as unallocated and uninitialized.

I'd really like to try and save the terabyte worth of data on it so just formatting it would pretty much defeat the purpose of hooking it up. Anyone have any suggestions on how to handle this without nuking the drive?

DSzymborski · Jul 28, 2014

Have you tried software-based file recovery, something like Recuva (which is free)?

fzabkar · Jul 28, 2014

Some external drives (eg WD My Book Essentials) are encrypted and need the USB-SATA bridge PCB to decrypt the data.

Other external drives (eg WD's and Seagate's 3TB models) are configured with 4KB sectors. When you remove such a drive from its enclosure and connect it directly to a SATA controller on your computer's motherboard, you expose the drive's native 512e sectoring and render the data inaccessible.

Psyckosama · Jul 28, 2014

And it just happens to be a 1tb My Book Essential... >_<

fzabkar · Jul 28, 2014

You will need to find a matching replacement PCB, or you will need to repair the existing one. Sometimes there are simple faults that lend themselves to a DIY repair.

BTW, you must not write to the drive outside its enclosure. There is a special SmartWare section at the end of the drive. Within this area is a "key" sector. You must not overwrite this sector, else your data will become inaccessible.

The USB-SATA bridge firmware hides the SmartWare area from the user.

Psyckosama · Jul 28, 2014

I managed to get the old board working and I think I've managed it.

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External to Internal HDD problems

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