HDD problems... 3 beeps, now its location is not available

obloquy

Reputable
Feb 25, 2018
20
0
4,510
Hey, got some Hard drive issues. I run Windows OS off of a 250 Samsung SSD... I bought a 4TB Seagate HDD from Ebuyer 32 days ago . All programs installed are put on the HDD drive, so its purely for storage. This morning as I had the pc open the HDD made some weird noises, 3 beeps... pause... 3 beeps... pause... click etc. I restarted the pc and windows booted up but I got this message...

Location not available

Even though the windows os runs off of the SSD as C drive, I couldn't open anything as the HDD drive couldn't be located.. Looking under disk management, the HDD is listed as "Unknown device" when connected. Has my brand new hard drive failed on me a month after its purchase? is there any way of retrieving anything that I had saved on it? :(

Any help my much appriciated
 

DSzymborski

Curmudgeon Pursuivant
Moderator
First thing I'd do is try a different SATA cable and if that doesn't work, another motherboard port too. It's good to rule out the basic problems first.

After that, you can also try taking your hard drive out and seeing if it can be read inside an enclosure connected to USB.

I won't lie to you, a clicking sound from a hard drive is very bad news. If you cannot get the hard drive to read under any circumstances, software-based tools like Recuva won't be able to get you your data and if you need what's on the hard drive, you're talking very expensive hard drive recovery.

Hard drives can fail at any time, which is why it's very important to have a regular backup plan. It's a basic part of PC ownership, no different than changing the oil in your car or the filter in your furnace. The 3-2-1 strategy is frequently used, meaning that for anything you don't want to lose, you should have 3 copies, in at least 2 different devices locally, with at least 1 copy off-site.
 

obloquy

Reputable
Feb 25, 2018
20
0
4,510
Sorry Skynetrising, thought I took pictures of both.

The HDD is now being shown in the Device Manager. But when I reboot the pc, I hear 3 beeps from the HDD. This is what appears in the Disk Managment..

Disk Management

Device Manager


Thanks for the advice DSzymborski, doesn't look great lol, I usually back all the important things so ive only lost one or two things that I didn't back up over the last 2 or 3 days. So its not a massive deal but just a bit inconvienient
 
Try Minitool Partition Wizard free - partition recovery function.
It might be able to restore partition table of your drive.

Also check health of your drive. Use HDtune health. Post screenshot.
Either drive is faulty or you're using bad sata cable and cable needs to be replaced.
 

DSzymborski

Curmudgeon Pursuivant
Moderator


Glad you do have a backup plan! You wouldn't believe how many people come here wanting to recover data off a grinding hard drive and tell us that their only copies of 20 years of photos or only copy of important work material covering a year are on that hard drive.