My external hard drive is now empty

[mamabear56]

Hello, I just plugged my Western Digital external hard drive back into my desk top and the "file folder is empty." This is very distressing, as I had everyone for my school and business backed up on it. That's what it's for, right? I had it unplugged while I suffered from a couple of viruses. Monday a tech guy was able to clean them out. Now my external isn't working, but the computer recognizes used space on it. If there's space being used, how can it be empty? I know just enough about computers to get into trouble, so this has me pinned. Can someone please help me???

 

[scout_03]

try recuva on it to see if it could find the files it's free http://www.piriform.com/recuva

 

[WyomingKnott]

Some suggestions. You could

0) Try it in another machine.

1) Download and run WinDirStat. A great tool for showing you where data is used; you click on a big block of space and it will tell you what directory it's in. Set the option to display hidden space.

2) Log in as an admin and look on the root of that drive for hidden files, hidden folders, or things that you are not allowed to open.

3) Download a tool such as EASEUS partition recovery or Recuva and see if you can recover the files.

3) If the contents of the drive is backups, praise the gods of storage and just re-back-up your primary copies. Sort of a last choice.

 

[mamabear56]

***UPDATE***
Thanks soooo much, scout and Wyoming!!! I downloaded the recuva program and spent several hours trying to retrieve my data, which showed up as hidden. My daughter, who's an area manager for a gaming company, helped me. I then had a tech guy spend 2 hours by remote trying to figure it out. He told me there was nothing he could do, and to contact WD. The next morning I turned on my computer, ready for a grueling day, only to find my wd external drive fine, as if nothing had happened! I ran the recuva again, letting it run for hours while I was at school. It told me that nothing had been deleted and no partitions had been over-written...???

Do you think that he somehow reset or unlocked something, causing the external to start working normally again?? Should I be worried about future problems with this device??

Thanks much for your help!!!

 

[scout_03]

i would pass it to data lifeguard diiagnostic from wd to be shure of the drive healt http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=113&sid=3&lang=en