Is my hard drive dead?

[lilj0unior]

Hey guys, so I built my own gaming pc around november-december last year, and it was running smooth. But yesterday I noticed that my Hard Drive (WD Black 2tb) is not recognized on my pc. it didn't show on disk management either. I wasn't able to access my BIOS since I had fast boot on, so I cleared bios and noticed that it's now recognized by my pc again (yay) and all the folders and files were there. Fast forward to today around 13-14 hours later, I'm on my pc and it's not recognized anymore, not on disk management, and not in the BIOS. can someone please help? I have a Z170x Gaming-3 Gigabyte motherboard, an i5-6600k and I also have an intel 256gb m.2 ssd (Which is my main boot drive) and the 2tb WD black is for storage. Is my hard drive dead?

 

[firefoxx04]

If the data is important, you should already have a backup solution.

I would start by dumping the data to an external drive. Then run Western Digitals SMART tools to see how the drive is doing.

If it is not making any strange noises and the files are not corrupt, the drive is likely fine. Perhaps it is not connected securely?

 

[lilj0unior]

If the data is important, you should already have a backup solution.

I would start by dumping the data to an external drive. Then run Western Digitals SMART tools to see how the drive is doing.

If it is not making any strange noises and the files are not corrupt, the drive is likely fine. Perhaps it is not connected securely?

I checked the connection, the connection is secured fine. It's not making any weird noises either.

 

[psiclone]

It may be more appropriate to look for a solution in this case, than try to determine what the actual problem is. By this I mean, consider a BIOS update or chipset driver update. That can often help in cases like this. An alternative is to try a different drive and see how that performs, but it only matters if you have one lying around.

 

[psiclone]

The only other suggestion I have is that maybe your power supply is wack and isn't giving full power all the time, but that's not likely the issue here.

 

[lilj0unior]

It may be more appropriate to look for a solution in this case, than try to determine what the actual problem is. By this I mean, consider a BIOS update or chipset driver update. That can often help in cases like this. An alternative is to try a different drive and see how that performs, but it only matters if you have one lying around.

Yeah I don't have many tech thins lying around :/. But now that you say it, it might be just a needed driver update, since I just cleared CMOS again, and the drive is recognized again. I think it stops getting recognized after I restart or shut down my pc

 

[psiclone]

It may be more appropriate to look for a solution in this case, than try to determine what the actual problem is. By this I mean, consider a BIOS update or chipset driver update. That can often help in cases like this. An alternative is to try a different drive and see how that performs, but it only matters if you have one lying around.

Yeah I don't have many tech thins lying around :/. But now that you say it, it might be just a needed driver update, since I just cleared CMOS again, and the drive is recognized again. I think it stops getting recognized after I restart or shut down my pc

A driver and/or BIOS update can clear problems like that, but it's not guaranteed. Just be careful with the BIOS update. While they're much easier to do these days than they used to be, they can still cause irreparable damage to the motherboard.

 

[psiclone]

It may be more appropriate to look for a solution in this case, than try to determine what the actual problem is. By this I mean, consider a BIOS update or chipset driver update. That can often help in cases like this. An alternative is to try a different drive and see how that performs, but it only matters if you have one lying around.

Yeah I don't have many tech thins lying around :/. But now that you say it, it might be just a needed driver update, since I just cleared CMOS again, and the drive is recognized again. I think it stops getting recognized after I restart or shut down my pc

This may also be of use.

https://www.custompcreview.com/articles/top-5-best-free-tools-testing-ssd-hdd-performance-windows/36975/

 

[Tom Tancredi]

SO changing it from Fastboot, which is to bypass UEFI (the replacement to BIOS, BIOS doesn't exist anymore) and run right into loading the OS code, it made the drive enabled. But then again the issue repeated.
Did you check the Fastboot option again?
Did you plug this drive into another computer?
Can try and get a USB to SATA connection (depending how large the drive is may need a external power connector as well if it us 3.5mm large) and see if you can see it via your USB?
If no joy on all this then yes your drive sounds like it had a hard error. You should see about getting a Warranty replacement from the manufacturer since they usually under a 3 to as much as 10 year warranty. But the Data is GONE period.

 

[clarkjd]

It is possible that this is heat related. You say that the drive is recognized when booting up a cold PC, but fails after being 'on' for a period of time. I would get as much data off the drive as possible, and RMA it to WD.You could try mounting it in an external case in order to remove it from the interior of your PC case.