1TB 7200RPM Seagate External Cannot Be Recognized

[trevlevs]

I've had it for about 8 months now, and a couple weeks ago I dropped it, and ever since then it hasn't been working. The external HDD still powers on, so today I decided to break it out of it's case and now I've got just the HDD with the mount attached with the AC adapter and Mini USB plugged in. I went to Computer->Manage->Disk Management and sure enough, it appears as Disk 1, but when I try to edit its Drive Letter and Path it says I need to refresh the view, and even after that it doesn't work. Is there any way I can mess with this to gain access to it? Worst case scenario I go spend $20 on a SATA to USB connector, but I'd rather not do that.

Thanks!

-Trevor

 

[compulsivebuilder]

You could try plugging it directly into a SATA port on the motherboard. If you are lucky, and the USB board is the part that broke when you dropped it, then it may work fine on the SATA port. Failing that, you will probably have to spend some money. Maybe buy an identical external drive, open that one too, and swap the hard drives. Or you could try a disk dock - they aren't expensive, and they can be useful.

I would suggest copying the data off the drive, then consider discarding it - the drive may have been damaged when you dropped it, and it would be unfortunate to put more on it, only to have it fail.

 

[trevlevs]

Best answer selected by trevlevs.