External Hard Drive Not Working Anymore

[aler115]

I was using my external hard drive to save my steam games.So I could play them after I reboot my Operating system.
I downloaded a game today and tried to copy it to the HD but it was giving errors and saying some stuff about offline etc. etc.an unexpected error is keeping you from copying
I tried to delete the content on the HD but it was not doing anything at all.
I tried to copy game again and it was doing nothing again.
I plugged it out and in but nothing has changed
I think I hit the HD once, after that my PC did not seem to recognize it.
In the disk management it was showing up but with no memory at all, it was not initialized.
When I tried to initialize it, it gave some errors about files are unable to read etc.
I plugged it out and in again and in gave an error about the device is malfunctioned.
When I plug it, it DOES show the driver installing stuff on the bottom(most used style) bar

Unknown Not Initialized

Either way it gives error about "The system cannot find the path specified"

This external hard drive had 200 GB s of game in it
It is very frustrating

 

[ss202sl]

Seems like the drive is dead.

 

[photonboy]

Hey,
There's a chance it's not the main drive but rather the USB-> SATA interface board that is damaged.

I had a WD USB drive before that failed and I cracked open the case and installed it into my PC and it was fine. Obviously this voids any warranty.

 

[SuperSoph_WD]

I'm sorry to hear about your issues with the WD Elements external drive, @aler115!
However, these errors seem pretty concerning and I'm not sure you will be able to recover your files without the assistance of a professional data recovery company. I'd strongly recommend you use WD's Data LifeGuard Diagnostics for Windows and run the QUICK and EXTENDED tests to determine the health and SMART status of the external drive.
You should keep in mind that portable external HDDs are not designed for gaming storage. Moreover, hitting the HDD even once could be fatal to its health and physical state.

Hope this helps you, though. Keep us posted!
SuperSoph_WD

 

[photonboy]

1) Not sure the above WD post is helpful if he can't even access the drive. How is he supposed to run diagnostics?

2) be careful that you don't format the drive if you manage to get access to it or you'll have a hard time getting your data back.

Anyway, I'm not saying you have the same issue, but I had the EXACT same symptoms and it was the USB->SATA board that was the issue. The internal drive worked fine when i removed it from the case.

 

[SuperSoph_WD]

1) Not sure the above WD post is helpful if he can't even access the drive. How is he supposed to run diagnostics?
2) be careful that you don't format the drive if you manage to get access to it or you'll have a hard time getting your data back.
Anyway, I'm not saying you have the same issue, but I had the EXACT same symptoms and it was the USB->SATA board that was the issue. The internal drive worked fine when i removed it from the case.

Hey, @photonboy!

He should be able to run the diagnostics without any issues, even though he is unable to access the contents of the drive itself. As long as the external is detected by the system (Disk management and Device manager), the utility should also be able to recognize it and run the diagnostics on the drive.

Indeed, he could also get the drive out of the enclosure since the WD Elements doesn't incorporate a hardware encryption. But before doing that he needs to make sure the external drive is not covered by the limited warranty. Otherwise, tampering with the external HDD physically will void the warranty on the drive. In this case, he won't be able to RMA it and get a replacement (if it's still covered).

SuperSoph_WD

 

[photonboy]

Update:
1) Just FYI, but if you INITIALIZE the device you will end up losing the data (and would have to use data recovery software to recover files, but not the folder structure)

2) Test with another PC, but if you get similar issues that likely confirms a defective unit.

3) As per above, I'm not sure about whether you can TEST or not, though I'm not sure what the point would be since it's unusable right now.

4) As per above, I did say the Warranty would be void, however his data is probably worth the risk as sending it in as is won't get his data back, but if the main drive still works (attach via SATA power and data cables) his data would still be there.

 

[JaredDM]

Update:
1) Just FYI, but if you INITIALIZE the device you will end up losing the data (and would have to use data recovery software to recover files, but not the folder structure)

Actually initializing just creates a new MBR in sector 0, nothing more. So good data recovery software would still be able to recover full file structure. I deal with this all the time when people take drives out of My Book enclosures, not knowing they are encrypted, and are prompted to initialize (thus writing a non-encrypted MBR over the encrypted one).

But, I agree with photonboy that it's best to just try plugging into another computer to confirm. No point running WD's diagnostic tool, at all.

 

[photonboy]

Update:
1) Just FYI, but if you INITIALIZE the device you will end up losing the data (and would have to use data recovery software to recover files, but not the folder structure)

Actually initializing just creates a new MBR in sector 0, nothing more. So good data recovery software would still be able to recover full file structure. I deal with this all the time when people take drives out of My Book enclosures, not knowing they are encrypted, and are prompted to initialize (thus writing a non-encrypted MBR over the encrypted one).

But, I agree with photonboy that it's best to just try plugging into another computer to confirm. No point running WD's diagnostic tool, at all.

You aren't disagreeing with what I said so not sure why you linked to me post. I did say he'd need data recovery software if he initialized.

 

[JaredDM]

Update:
1) Just FYI, but if you INITIALIZE the device you will end up losing the data (and would have to use data recovery software to recover files, but not the folder structure)

Actually initializing just creates a new MBR in sector 0, nothing more. So good data recovery software would still be able to recover full file structure. I deal with this all the time when people take drives out of My Book enclosures, not knowing they are encrypted, and are prompted to initialize (thus writing a non-encrypted MBR over the encrypted one).

But, I agree with photonboy that it's best to just try plugging into another computer to confirm. No point running WD's diagnostic tool, at all.

You aren't disagreeing with what I said so not sure why you linked to me post. I did say he'd need data recovery software if he initialized.

I was disagreeing with where you said you could recover the files "but not the folder structure". You absolutely can recover the folder structure. MBR is just a partition table, the MFT is where the folder structure is stored.

 

[photonboy]

ah, well in my experience with several drives the FOLDER STRUCTURE wasn't recoverable with several different types of data recovery software but this is not my area of expertise so I'll take your word for it