500 GB WD Hard Drive Problem

Gian Rodney Veluz

Reputable
Jan 17, 2015
2
0
4,510
Hello, good day! I have a 500 GB WD My Passport Hard Drive. I use it almost every day and half of what I have digitally is stored there (Anime, series, music, pictures, school files and work files, installers etc).
So here's the problem. It suddenly displayed this three blinking lights on its LED and then it shuts off, rendering my external hard drive to be inaccessible. It will blink like 3-9 times before it will turn off.
Whenever I plug it on my laptop, it displays, “The last USB device you connected to this computer malfunctioned, and Windows does not recognize it. The system (Windows 7) detects the hard drive but the hard drive shuts itself off before I can access my files there.
Bear in mind that it works perfectly before it malfunctioned like that. I don’t remember my hard drive falling from a height as it is always placed just beside my laptop.
I also tried connecting it on our home desktop, to my brother’s laptop and it still gives the same problem. I am familiar with the tech stuff and I am hoping that I could get some advice. Thank you!
 
Solution
Hi there Gian Rodney Veluz,

After you have tried the drive on different systems and the problem persists, there are three options: 1) faulty cable, 2) something wrong with the enclosure, 3)something wrong with the drive itself. You should try connecting the drive with a different USB cable(Y type preferably). If the issue persists, and the drive disconnects really fast so you can't access your data, you may need to contact a data recovery company. You can check WD's Data Recovery Partners out: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=rWLa2o Another thing is that the WD My Passport is hardware encrypted. So, you will not be able to retrieve the data if the drive is not in the enclosure. In case you don't need the data, I guess you...

DSzymborski

Titan
Moderator
Your best bet is to try software recovery and try to get as much off as you can, if anything. I personally use Recuva, but there are other choices out there.

If it's a physical issue, your best bet is to pay a data recovery firm to see what they can get off the drive. This will not be inexpensive.

Hard drives don't need to be dropped to fail - it's one of the components that is most likely to fail. That's why backing up irreplaceable data is so important. Hopefully your data is either replaceable or you luck out with software as this can be a pretty cruel lesson.
 
Hi there Gian Rodney Veluz,

After you have tried the drive on different systems and the problem persists, there are three options: 1) faulty cable, 2) something wrong with the enclosure, 3)something wrong with the drive itself. You should try connecting the drive with a different USB cable(Y type preferably). If the issue persists, and the drive disconnects really fast so you can't access your data, you may need to contact a data recovery company. You can check WD's Data Recovery Partners out: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=rWLa2o Another thing is that the WD My Passport is hardware encrypted. So, you will not be able to retrieve the data if the drive is not in the enclosure. In case you don't need the data, I guess you can just take the drive out of the enclosure -> format it -> and use it as an internal or in a third party enclosure. In case you need the data though, you should not take it out.

D_Know_WD
 
Solution