IDE HDD 2.5 "Device not prepared"

[OGUH57]

Greetings everyone!!

So I found a old laptop laying around my house with the screen not working so I thought it would come in handy to take the hard drive to work as a external hard drive, since backing up my work it's kind of a necessity.
I found out it's a Segate 40 GB IDE 2.5 HDD, I bought a IDE HDD enclosure to USB 2.0 but everytime I try o initiate the device a message comes along saying "Device not prepared".

I would like to know if any of you would help me fixing it, if it can be fixed at all. The data inside of it isn't relevant. Just keep in mind I'm not a computer genious.

Thank you in advanced!

 

[JaredDM]

Solution: Throw it away and find another old piece of junk to use.

It's not worth your time fixing it, and it's certainly not worth any of our time trying to help you fix it. Not when the data doesn't matter.

 

[D_Know_WD]

Hi there OGUH57,

I would totally agree with JaredDM.

In most cases, when there's something wrong with a drive, you just replace it. It's good that you don't really have some important data over there.

One thing you can try is to find a desktop with IDE ports, so you can attach the drive directly. That way you will rule out a possible enclosure related issue. If the issue persists, then get a new, more reliable drive for your back ups.

Cheers,
D_Know_WD