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Seagate Backup Plus Desktop 2TB unusable; not showing up in Disk Management, but is in Device Manager. Help?

Tags:
  • Storage
  • Desktops
  • Backup
  • Computers
  • Seagate
Last response: in Storage
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October 2, 2014 12:32:18 PM

A few days ago, my Seagate external (http://amzn.com/B00HFRWXV0) stopped working. My brother was using it to install a repack (game) and his computer froze on him, so the drive was yanked out and the PC restarted. Prior to this, Windows told me the drive had errors on it, most likely referring to some corrupt data I already knew about and hadn't yet got around to repairing. I find it unlikely that either of these two could have caused my drive to fail, since to my knowledge, drives cannot die because of corrupt data; the data may be lost, but it shouldn't kill the whole thing.

Current symptoms
When plugging in the drive via USB, my computer plays the device detected sound and it shows up in Device Manager with the correct name.
It is unusable since it doesn't show up in either My Computer or Disk Management.
The drive doesn't emit any noises that suggest hardware failure. After spin up, I only hear its usual hum. There are no clicks, scratches, or loose items bouncing around in it.

It behaves the same in all 4 computers I've tested it on. It's also the 3rd Seagate to fail on me; a few weeks ago, I had a Seagate 2.5 External mysteriously fail on me as well, but this one wasn't yanked out or anything like that. It was working fine, and then when I plugged it in one day, it was no longer recognized.

So two things:
1. I would like to plug it in internally, but the SATA cables I have are of the smaller variety. Can anyone point me to these cables, http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf-JAVA/Doc/images/446/c01..., on Amazon?
2. Could it be that the drive's controller failed? And if so, is there anything I can do to regain access to the data? Can the controller be replaced?

More about : seagate backup desktop 2tb unusable showing disk management device manager

October 2, 2014 12:36:59 PM

1. Those cables are SATA and SATA power cables. I am not sure what you mean by "of the smaller variety."
2. If the important parts of your HDD like the MFT become corrupted then your drive could indeed become unusable.
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October 2, 2014 2:35:32 PM

For reference, these are the "smaller" cables I have for my internal drive: http://s18.postimg.org/nuwkclwp5/20141002_154129.jpg

Is there a relatively easy way to rule out the controller as the problem?
And, can the MFT be repaired if it is corrupted?
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October 8, 2014 9:02:06 PM

I got SeaTools and installed it to test the drive. Initially, the drive was not detected.. but after hitting rescan it popped up, although its serial number, model number and firmware remained unavailable. (I know this unidentified drive is the external because the testing caused it to spin up, and made it hum a bit louder.) So I ran a SMART check and a short drive self test. Both passed, but the drive still doesn't show up in either My Computer or Disk Management. It still, however shows up in Device Manager. Any thoughts as to what exactly is wrong? Could it be the logic board?

I'd still like to try plugging it in internally. So is this the right power cable? http://amzn.com/B002N2EHVQ Would I be able to use that and this data cable, http://amzn.com/B009GUXU52 to connect it internally?
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October 9, 2014 12:01:22 PM

that picture of your existing cables looks like a SATA power cable to me. You shouldn't need to buy that power splitter unless your existing PSU does not have any more plugs available.
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14 minutes ago

Oh. Not sure why I thought they were incompatible then. Anyway, I connected it internally. UEFI took longer to POST and 7 took longer to load as well. In UEFI, the drive was not displayed, and it wasn't displayed in anything Windows (Device Manager, Disk Management, My Computer).. but Seatools still detected it and the same tests pass.
Don't want to try running any of the fix options until I'm sure about what I'm dealing with.
So could it just be the logic board?
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