External Hard Drive too full to open

[AnInfant]

I recently put some things onto my external hard drive that was almost full. I didnt get any warning saying that there is no space available or anything, but now i cant access the hard drive. It shows up as connected to my computer without any problem but when i open it, it doesnt load up and then it will stop working and close that window. I cant make more room on the hardrive because i cant access it. I know it isnt my computer because i tried it on another (brand new) computer and it didnt work on that either (same problem). Any ideas on how i can access it?

 

[Tide]

Try this... Start --> Run --> cmd <enter> then when the console window opens, type (without quotes) "chkdsk /f <drive letter>" where <drive letter> is the drive letter of your external drive. For example... chkdsk /f g: (this will check disk g: for errors and fix them) Let me know what your results are.

 

[D_Know_WD]

Hi there AnInfant,

After the chkdsk command you can try to defragment your HDD. I think that this might help.
You can check out the following link: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/improve-performance-defragmenting-hard-disk#1TC=windows-7

Hope this will help,
D_Know_WD

 

[AnInfant]

Tide,
I tried the chkdsk comman but it says "The drive, the path, or the file name is not valid."

D_Know_WD,
Im a little worried about defragmenting. ive never done it before and im worried it might stuff up my hard drive.

 

[D_Know_WD]

This message most of the time means that the command was entered incorrectly. Make sure you have written it right: chkdsk c: /f
c: is the the letter of the HDD. If your HDD has a letter K: then the command should be chkdsk k: /f

Regarding the defragmentation, I would say that it will not hurt the HDD. You can check some articles up in the internet.

Cheers,
D_Know_WD

 

[AnInfant]

OK, i did the chkdsk and now it is correcting errors.
UPDATE: OK so after waiting quit a while for those errors to be corrected, the cmd finally finished and im happy to say that i can now access my HDD. Thank you both for helping me.

 

[D_Know_WD]

Glad that the chkdsk solved your issue. You can do some regular checks on this drive though.

Cheers,
D_Know_WD