CHKDSK /R on External Hard Drive frozen...???

[Guest]

Hi everyone,
So as the title states I'm having an issue with CHKDSK /r being performed on my external hard drive. So let me explain as best as I can what's going on.

My WD 1TB hard drive has been acting up lately. Haven't been able to open large files without lagging, unable to transfer files to and from my external hard drive, etc. I first ran Disk Management to see if my drive(s) were okay. My laptop's hard drive was in perfect condition and it also stated that my external hard drive was 100% Healthy, it was still it NTSF format (not RAW), so that all seemed okay. SO, after doing some research I took it upon myself to run a chkdsk /r on the external hard drive to see if that could clean it up. The scan was doing just fine but given the fact that there were so many files having to be scanned (465000 files) I decided to just let it run over night while I went to sleep. This morning however, I checked on it and it was at Stage 4, 11%, file number 454146. It's been sitting at that stage/file number all day. I believe what had happened was the external hard drive had eventually locked itself. It generally does this if it is not being used or if the laptop goes to sleep (which it did not btw). So I figured I could just unlock the drive and maybe chkdsk /r would pick up where it left off. Well, every time I go to My Computer it basically freezes and if I try to click/right on any drive in the My Computer window it goes to "Not Responding" thus making it impossible for me to unlock the drive and forcing Explorer to restart.
SO, my question is how can I fix this? The chkdsk has been frozen at the same stage and I really don't know if it will make any more progress while the drive is locked.
Any suggestions?
Thanks!

 

[Guest]

Ok, so a minor update to my issue. After trying to click on a particular drive within My Computer, after waiting long enough and getting through the "Not Responding" issue, it finally cleared up and allowed me to easily click on whatever I needed to, so that's cleared up. However, the external hard drive itself is still inaccessible :/
So, the issue still remains. What can I do if chkdsk /r is STILL stuck on the same file and not making progress, and the EHD seems to be locked? Hmmm

 

[D_Know_WD]

Hi there jsparker13,

Sorry that you are facing issues with your WD drive. 🙁
Unfortunately, my guess would be that the drive is failing.
So you can't access the drive right? My suggestion would be to boot up Ubuntu from a CD or a flash drive and try to access the drive. In case you can do that, you need to get the data off the drive. Here's a thread on that: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/267999-32-recover-data-mode
Also, I guess you can try some data recovery tool: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-1644496/lost-data-recovery.html

After that, you can test the drive with WD's Data Lifeguard Diagnostic tool. The results should show you the overall health status of the drive and if there is something wrong with it: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=urinPd

Is the drive under warranty?

Let me know how this goes,
D_Know_WD

 

[Guest]

Hey,
So sorry for the late response. I've been away form my laptop for a few days and got kind of burnt out on trying to troubleshoot my issue.
Anyways, thanks for your reply! I did however just wind up ending the chkdsk process via task manager, shut down my computer, unplugged my external hard drive, and restarted everything. So, I'm basically back to where I was. I can, however, access my external hard drive with no problem; I was just unable to access it during the chkdsk /r process that I couldn't do so. So now my issue (and most primary issue to begin with) is simply being unable to play/open larger files and being unable to transfer files to and from the external hard drive.
I'll definitely be sure to look into your links, specifically the second and third one you posted. Is the data recovery tool the proper antidote for my situation? Either way, I'll try it out.
Thanks again!

 

[D_Know_WD]

You can consider the Ubuntu Live CD approach as well. Ubuntu seems to handle better some problematic drives.

Cheers,
D_Know_WD