Hard Drive Not Powering, Need some more ideas

[jmoges]

My mom got a 3TB Seagate GoFlex external drive a couple of years ago, worked for a little while and then she realized it just stopped working. It was supposed to be saving all of her stuff to the external but her internal drive filled up and she realized it wasn't going to the external. I tried plugging it into other computers and none recognized it. You could still hear the drive spin up and then it would sound like it turned back off. Eventually took it out of its enclosure and tried plugging it straight into my computer to see if maybe the enclosure was the problem. It would not show up in the BIOS, checked all of my settings and nothing would get it to work. Went down to hear the drive and didn't sound like it was spinning or getting power. Tried using the enclosure base with its power and plugged the sata into my mobo, still no power.

I have looked around and some recommend replacing the pcb on the drive, some don't. Looking closely at the pcb it looks like there might be some damage but I can't be sure.

Any other ideas? I hate to throw away that much storage that was never even used. How often does replacing the pcb actually work?

Thanks

 

[photonboy]

There are TWO main components in external drives:
1) the enclosure
2) the main hard drive

The main hard drive SHOULD be accessible like a normal internal drive when you attach the SATA and POWER cables, bootup and format it. If this does NOT work then the drive is broken and there's simply NOTHING you can do.

I'm not sure what you mean about replacing the PCB. You can't do that on the main drive, and if the enclosure was defective it would be best to either use the drive internally by itself or purchase a different USB/SATA enclosure from Vantec or elsewhere.

 

[photonboy]

If you need to REPLACE that drive, here are two choices

1) INTERNAL DRIVE (Western Digital RED version; the RED is built for long-term reliability)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822236343

2) EXTERNAL
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136876

 

[jmoges]

What I mean about replacing the pcb is the one on the drive. I have found mixed results on this though and wanted to get some more opinions. The drive isn't getting power anymore it doesn't seem, wanted to replace the circuit board to see if something was wrong with the board on the drive. I dont think that is going to work though. Looks like Seagate made another paperweight. I'll just tell her to use it as such. That's the only use I have been able to get from their drives...

 

[photonboy]

What I mean about replacing the pcb is the one on the drive. I have found mixed results on this though and wanted to get some more opinions. The drive isn't getting power anymore it doesn't seem, wanted to replace the circuit board to see if something was wrong with the board on the drive. I dont think that is going to work though. Looks like Seagate made another paperweight. I'll just tell her to use it as such. That's the only use I have been able to get from their drives...

Replacing that PCB is only recommended for trying to recover important data. I'm not sure of the cost, or how difficult it would be but it's not even something you consider if there's no data you need on the platters.

All the main drive companies have SIMILAR returns of defective drives though it does vary by product.

If there's no requirement for a USB drive, then get the WD RED drive I linked. If USB is needed, then consider the other one.

*Not sure if this matters, but I use my WD Elements USB drive with my WD LIVE HUB (media device for TV). It automatically turns on and off with the HUB so it's plug in and forget. I have various videos including family videos from our camera. I can plug the drive into my PC directly or just work over the network (it appears if the HUB it's attached to is on, using Windows Explorer).

 

[photonboy]

See PCB problem needs to be strictly handled by experts because if the data stored in the hard drive is very important for you then you need not to do anything by your own with the hard drive PCB as it will make you to lose your data for forever. So, the best solution to consult data recovery experts to recover your data.

It's probably $5000 or so to recover a hard drive using a professional service.

You can buy an identical hard drive and swap the PCB. I'm not saying it will definitely work, but it's an option and that won't damage your data anyway as it's still sitting on the drive platters. Also, if it works fine then you can keep that hard drive so there's no extra cost since you would have bought a new one anyway.

If the drive functions but the formatting is messed up then you use file recovery software (require another hard drive to transfer the data to) such as EASEUS makes.

If a drive was still under Warranty you could swap the PCB, recover your data, then swap the PCB's back and RMA the defective drive (there may be a sticker placed so you'd break the seal though; no idea on that).

Here's a video on PCB swapping:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJx6BuTjDmI