Harddrive spins but nothing pops up

[Manisha_1]

Hi, My Seagate External harddrive has stopped working. When i connect it to the computer nothing pops up anywhere, but the hard drive still spins. I need to recover the files at the very least, any help will be greatly appreciated

 

[SuperSoph_WD]

Welcome to the community, Manisha_1!

I'd suggest you go to Disk Management and Device Manager to see if the external HDD is recognized there at least. If it's not, then you should try using a different USB cable with it or try a different USB port to see if it will pop up then.
If you have access to another computer, you can even try plugging it there to see how it will get detected.
Another thing that you could try is uninstalling the external as a device from the Device Manager ( https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc725782.aspx )
If you can successfully detect it in any of those places, it's highly recommended to run the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic tool to check up on the health and SMART status. You should be able to find such a utility on their website.

Good luck! Keep me posted!
SuperSoph_WD

 

[Manisha_1]

nope, nothing

 

[Supernova1138]

How are you connecting the drive to your computer? If it's an eSATA based drive, then you need to enable hot plug on the SATA port the eSATA port is connected to in the BIOS for the drive to actually be picked up.

 

[SuperSoph_WD]

Hey there again, Manisha_1!

Have you tried connecting the external HDD to another computer and see if it will pop up there yet? If it's spinning, that means that it receives power from your computer. However, it's possible that it's not enough for Windows to get it detected properly.
Unless you get the drive detected anywhere, you won't be able to attempt data recovery by yourself and you'd need the professional assistance of a data recovery company. Either way, you can still take a look at this thread: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-1644496/lost-data-recovery.html

However, I'd strongly recommend you to contact your external HDD manufacturer's customer support for assistance and data recovery referrals.

Hope it helps you. Best of luck!
SuperSoph_WD