Iomega Prestige 1TB no power

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nmflygirl

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Aug 25, 2010
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Hi
I have an Iomega Prestige 1Tb external hard drive that won't power up. Iomega will replace the drive but I need the data on the drive and that is up to me to "recover". As far as I know there was no "event" that caused the problem, it just worked one day and not the next. I want to take the drive out of the Prestige case and put it in another case I have so that I can power it up and grab the data - then I'll send the Prestige back to Iomega for a replacement. Chatting with their support, they said I can try and they will still replace it (they don't "punish" customers for trying to recover their data before returning the drive).

There are two screws on the back end of the case which, when removed, allow me to remove that end panel and see the drive inside but I have no idea how to remove it. Looks like a permanent installation but someone got it in there so I must be able to get it out! There are no other screws visible on this case, no rubber feet or anything like that. It's a very slim, smoth, metal case, no hiding places. Any help? Or anyone know what I could do to try and fix the power problem without removing the drive? I tried another cord (I have another one of these drives), but that didn't work. Thank! April
 
Solution
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OK - I have this all worked out. Sorry for the multiple posts but maybe this info will be useful to someone else in the future. After removing the drive and removing the USB/AC adapter/card from the end of the drive I have access to the SATA ports and will cable this external drive to my pc as a slave. Assuming the integrity of the drive itself isn't compromised (should be fine), I will grab all my files. Then I'll put the external drive back together and send it to Iomega for replacement. Whew! Seems easy in retrospect, just took me awhile to get here.
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Ah, I figured out how to remove the drive. Very simple, just hadn't occurred to me. After removing the screws from the back end, I can pull it from the front end and the entire drive slips out of the metal case.

So, the next question is, what can I do with this? I have a case I purchased to house an old internal hard drive so that I could have it on my desktop, essentially "converting" it to an external drive. In that situation, the case has a ribbon cable that connects to the hard drive, same as the connection inside a CPU. I don't see a way to connect this Iomega drive with the ribbon cable. That said, now that I can see this drive up close, I don't think that would help anyhow cause the power board/switch is attached to the drive.

So now I'm thinking that I need to try and get a replacement power switch - which I assume means the entire little circuit board to which the switch is attached. I hope that is a replaceable part. I will call Iomega about this, but if anyone has any experience with this and wants to give me some tips, I'd appreciate it.

The bottom line is, I'm pretty certain that if I can get power to this drive, I can access the data and move it to another media.

Thanks!
 
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Any opinions about this idea? Assuming that power board can be removed and replaced, what if I remove the bad one, then remove the one from my good drive, attach to the other drive so I can move the files to my pc, then put the good power board back on my other drive? I don't want to end up in a situation where I ruin my other drive. I suppose there are no guarantees and I'd back that drive up first...anyone have any thoughts on this? Thanks.
 
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OK - I have this all worked out. Sorry for the multiple posts but maybe this info will be useful to someone else in the future. After removing the drive and removing the USB/AC adapter/card from the end of the drive I have access to the SATA ports and will cable this external drive to my pc as a slave. Assuming the integrity of the drive itself isn't compromised (should be fine), I will grab all my files. Then I'll put the external drive back together and send it to Iomega for replacement. Whew! Seems easy in retrospect, just took me awhile to get here.
 
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Solution
I have the same issue with my Iomega 1TB Desktop Hard Drive (no power light). Did you ever get yours to run again or did you wind up sending it back to Iomega for repair/replacement?
 
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Putting the drive in another drive case worked out. The problem is the Seagate adapter (card) that provides power to the drive (not the power cord). The drive itself is fine. Since I replaced the case on this Iomega, I had another one with the same problem. This second one was Seagate inside and out. Many of the external drives are Seagate on the inside regardless of the brand they are sold under (case brand). The Seagate drive we did return after putting it in another case, moving the data to other media then wiping the drive. The Iomega drive I just continued using in the new case.

The Iomega case was easy to open. The Seagate case was a mystery to even get started opening it, but I found a great video on YouTube where someone showed how to do it. Putting it back together was rough.

In most cases the manufacturer won't "punish" you for opening the drive case to try and retrieve your data because all they will do is send you a replacement drive - they do NOT recover your data for you. If you want it recovered you'll pay their service or another hundres or even in excess of $1,000 to grab your data. But you really don't need data recovery in these cases because your drive is likely fine. You just need to get power to it - via a new case.

I keep an extra SATA drive case around now, just in case I run into this problem again. I'm sure I will.

Personal tip - keep redundant backups of critical files. NEVER trust any one media source. Even the best hardware/media can go bad. So be prepared.
 
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By the way - if you return a drive to the manufacturer for replacement, read all of their instructions carefully. They usually tell you to send ONLY the drive, NOT the power cord or any other accessories. They will send you a refurbished drive as a replacement, but they will NOT send you another power cord or other accessories. If you send your cords back with the drive, they will NOT return them to you. You will have to purchase them on your own.
 
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Very useful thread, thank you
 
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Thank you is ALL i can say ! I, too, have TWO iOmega 1TB external 2.0 USB drives (maybe same model). Same exact problem: One day it worked, the next, turning power switch ON would not turn drive on! For a few weeks i had this sick feeling every time i thought about how much critical data was on the drive. Then one i day i typed a few key words into Google, and finally found YOUR thread. Read thru the whole thread, and it was like this little instruction manual for dealing with this specific problem. Two days ago, i gave it a try. When i got it disassembled to the point i could slip off that assembly that has the power switch, USB jack and power jack (attached to a circuit board that thank goodness SLIPS off the main body of the the drive itself (which in both cases are Seagate drives), i had hope. So i took apart my working one (after backing up all its data to a totally different drive), pulled that assembly off the good drive, slipped it onto the 'bad' one, and held my breath: Turned switch and light came on / drive came ON ! Connected USB to my MAC, and voila-- !!! There was my drive. So THANK YOU for all your posts here, that SAVED ME. Don't know if you'll ever get this reply, but i wanted to just THANK you for posting your repair journey / findings, even though nobody on the thread appears to have been able to help you.. well you definitely helped me... ;-)
 
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my iomega prestige 1tb external hdd powers up (after 2 or 3 mins), but the computer (windows vista o/s) does not recognize the drive. any ideas what might be wrong? there are no funny sounds from the hdd - i can hear the drive spinning up.
 
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Even though this is from very early this year and it is almost October of 2011 I just wanted to reply to your post so it will hopefully be indexed by Google and help anyone else with this problem in the future.

I too have an iomega external 1TB hard drive that I purchased for my father for Christmas last year. It never worked correctly from the start although I could sporadically copy files to it and use it. I got an RMA from Iomega and they sent a replacement external drive and it did the exact same thing. I ended up getting him a different brand external hard drive instead.

Well flash forward to today and I decide to see if those drives were really broken or not. I'm jacking around with them, they test OK, etc but then eventually they will either power off or Windows will tell me to format the drive, or it will stop showing up in explorer, etc. Finally I realize what you have said in your post...when they replaced the drive they had me keep the same stupid cable and power supply.

I still have both external drives and they are both fine., It is the power supply that has been causing issues all this time. Why doesn't iomega think of that as being the problem? I don't think testing the power occurred anywhere in the troubleshooting steps they provided. I appreciate your post even though the only thing that led me here was suspecting the power supply instead of something else when searching for solutions.!

Index this google!

iomega prestige portable one terabyte hard drive external troubleshooting issues problem power supply replace stop format disappears.
 
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Hi nmflygirl.

I have the same 1TB iomega external prestige harddisk and I'm having problems with it.
A metel piece from the hole of the harddisk in which the cable should be plugged in came out together with the cable when i was trying to unattach it.
Its just the case which has the problem but iomega is unable to fix it accept send me a new one.

You said that you purchased a new case and used it on the driver after you opened it.
What kind of harddisk case should i purchase? A case which supports 3.0USB or can i get the normal USB 2.0 case.

Sorry it crashed on me last week and I have no idea how to fix any of these electronic stuff until i chanced upon your post and is thinking of trying it out...

Would be great if you could help me in this because I've 800mb of school work in there which i need to get out!
Thanks so much

-Jodie
 
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Well it looks like Iomega have a faulty product here - I only had mine for about 4 weeks until it couldn't be found in My Computer. I tried the tip here - I contacted Iomega and suggested that it "must" be the power supply - as the comment above suggested - Iomega were kind enough to send me a new power plug today - and I was excited to get back all the family pics from the prestige harddrive...but bummed out incredibly. There is no change to the situation. The light is on..ok. It plinks when I plug it in - it just isn't found.

When I go to Device Manager I see that there is a message saying: 'The device could not start [Code 10]' and there is an exclamation mark highlighting a problem with the USB mass storage device.

Can anyone help me with this???? :cry:
 
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You could try verifying and reparing the disk on disk utility if you'r on a mac...

My totallly crashed
I took out the hardware and changed it to a new casing , tried recover softwares and it doesnt work still...
 
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@jodie3565 Unlucky! That was my next port of call - getting a SATA housing...feel like I'm running out of options somewhat now - anyone know where I can learn data recovery?
 
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Ok... i put the harddrive into a new external sata box... the computer installed the driver... however I have another problem. i encrypted the drive with the Iomega Encryption. under disc management it sees the drive as unallocated space... unfortunately... if I reformat i will loose all of the files i want to recover... How can i get the iomega software to recognise the drive? Do you think if i purchased the exact same drive i could swap out the two hardrives and get the computer to load the iomega software?
 
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Hi everyone. Great thread !
I have the same issue here with my 1TB "iOmega prestige" external hard disk. However the light on the case turns on but no sound can be heard from the hard disk, as if the drive isn't getting power. I tried removing it from the box and putting it in another one, but with no success. The same thing happens. The light on the new box turns on but the hard drive wont.

Any ideas !???
 
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Hi elkhyou.
I'm having the same problem with my own 1tb and 1.5tb hard-drive. Apparently the drive is dead. It must either be replaced or repaired. Now if you're replacing it you'll obviously want the data off it, however I've no idea how to open the case without smashing it, lol, so if you've any solutions there i'd gladly appreciate it. Another method I read was putting it into a sealed, air-tight bag and sticking it in a domestic freezer. They didn't say for how long but i'm going to test this out now and get back to you on it :)
Regards,
Prowlers34
 
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::::::>> Another 2 "DEAD" 1Tb IOMEGA Drives to report here <<::::::

I have 2 of the same drives 1 Tb Iomegas I got "on sale" at Frys electronics. They have been switched on probably less than a dozen times since I bought them 2-3yrs ago, but here's the following status of my 1Tb Iomega external HDs:
--1) one doesnt power on, nor light (the power led) and is silent (me thinks quite dead).
--2)the second one had been pronounced dead, however after reading a few posts here, I waited a while before unplugging and low and behold... the thing started making noises after a delay... but then a few clicks and it powers back off. The light doesn't work or at least the the power light doesn't turn on, nor can I access the data, but there is some weak signs of life (noise from the hard drive) initially before shutting back off.

It is past the warranty, so I don't have a legal leg to stand on, however, you won't find me rushing out to buy IOMEGA products any time soon.

itizlala <- IOMEGA former customer
 
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Thankyou for this.

I think I follow this up to the point where you say you will connect the iomega dive to your pc via the SATA port as a slave.

How do you connect the drive as a slave? What bits and pieces (eg cables) do I need to get? What part of my pc to I need to slot these cables into?

Please come back ...
 
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Hi to anyone reading this thread
i'm looking for the PCB inside an ioMega ultraMax that houses 2 drives & has the multi interfaces (usb host, usb client, firewire).
So if you have that or the whole unit lying around, drop me a reply.

cheers
 
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Honestly, I can't believe I didn't look into this sooner. I just declared the thing dead for the last 4 or 5 months :pfff:

As suggested through-out this thread. Just remove the two back screws, and pop the HDD out of the casing, gently pull the HDD out of the 'socket' of the casing. Be careful though, as mine practically fell out after I removed those two screws. After that (pending on your rig), all you have to do is throw it in your tower, connect the SATA cables, and turn your computer on. When I did this yesterday, I was/am running Windows 7 (64) and it immediately recognized, installed, and a quick restart, gave me 931 GB. No need to worry about slaving it or anything!

Of course this solution is only helpful if you don't mind having it as an internal HDD, but yea... at least it's better than completely scrapping it! Even if you don't want to do this, still take the HDD out, and sell it to somebody, and get some cash back!

Just thought I would give my story, in hopes it will help someone else!
Thank you to everyone who has posted here, as I would never have even thought to take the thing out of the casing!
:hello:
 
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I had the same problem, mine was Prestidge USB3 1Tb, but I was lucky because my product was still in wanranty, I think it is more than one year (you can easily see it in the iomega website when you register the product).

What I did is to ask for a replacement, and I think Iomega knows about this problem because they send me a new one without aking me to give old one before. So I could have both new and old at home so I opened the old one to extract the internal disc (connected by SATA connection) and pluged it into the new one. It worked perfectly.
Now I have to give back the old one, but I´m so happy because all my data is finaly saved.

Hope this helps
 
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