My iomega ego external hard drive suddenly not recognised

taisetu

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i have a iomega ego 250gb usb portable hd. runs off only the usb cable, has 2 connections at end but have only ever used 1, apparantly one is for extra power. have been using this succesfully for 3 years, various machines and xp and now win 7.
it gets plugged in and used about 2-3 times a week. a few days a go I plugged it it and the error message was "usb connection unsuccesful, devise not recognised". I unplugged it and plugged it back on and it recognised the drive as normal.
however last night plugged it in and the same error message came back on, but no matter how many time I retried, in a couple of usb ports and another computer, still not recognised. the HD has power, the blue light is on and you can feel the normal vibrations from the HD, win 7 makes the obligatoty beeps when you plug/unplug the HD.
devise manager - bus controllers says "unknown devise" with the nice yellow exclamation mark, and tells me that the correct drivers are installed and up to date.
the HD has not been dropped. any ideas?
 
You can try both ports. sometimes one board will not provide as much power as another. Some boards provide less power to the front ports.

If you still can not get it to work, there is a chance that the usb->ide or usb-> sata has failed. in this case, many times the drive data is accessible by removing the drive from the enclosure. If its sata it is easy as setting it up on your desktop system, but if it is IDE you need an adapter. Tt can be IDE(laptop)->IDE(desktop + power) or IDE(laptop)-> USB.

Hope this helps.
 

taisetu

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hi nukemaster. thanks for your help. have tried all those things. have a feeling that the bit where the usb cable fits into the HD is damaged. If I can find the right tool/screwdriver to take off the casing I might be able to see if it looks damaged, and maybe someone can get a similar or replacement part. trouble is I can't find anywhere so far that does replacement parts for this hd, and I am not goung to send it off to iomega or anywhere else. personal and private stuff on it. any more ideas from anyone much appreciated. cheers
 

taisetu

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taisetu

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cheers, it does look like what you have described, a star shaped very small screw. got photo of it but do not know how to post it here.
If I can get the insdes out of the case, does anyone think that it can be "transplanted" into another one. having never seen the inside of an iomega HD I cannot picture what I wish to do. cheers
 
yes, hard drives can be transplanted from case to case with ease(as long as the drive still works, this is why i recommend testing the bare drive on a computer before getting a new case if you can).

You can even buy the case for fairly cheap. you just have to know if the drive is SATA or PATA(IDE)

You can upload photos to a place like tinypic.com or imageshack.us and post them here

 

taisetu

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hi, according to reviews I found on the net, the iomega 250 ego ( now discontinued) has a Seagate Momentus 5400.4 SATA hd.
it is nice to know that you can remove them from the case to test...hopefully you can get little bits for them if they have broken off without ruining the drive
 
Is the little plastic thing that holds the usb pins missing on the drive? that could be an issue.

click for a bigger image
usb.jpg
 

taisetu

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hi, no the little plastic thing came off when I was examining it after the fault started. it was this that made me think that the usb connection could be part of the fault
 

taisetu

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my initial thoughts where that seeing as the drive was not often used, the part that gets most wear and tear is the usb connection port on the HD.
next step, take it apart somehow and take it from there.
cheers
 
it should just be remove those 2 screws and the drive will most likely slide out the front from that point(back comes off releasing the drive to slide out from the front in most cases).

Just remember to remove the drive screws as well once you are in. They may be on the side or bottom of the actual drive holder once you remove it. Then the drive should just slide away from the sata connector and be free.

Try not to apply pressure to the top of the drive either.
 

holliern

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did you have any luck? I believe I have the exact same hard drive with the exact same problem. the mini usb port broke and I need to put the hard drive in a new case.
 

taisetu

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hi, still trying to find a tool to undo the 4 little screws and then hopefully I believe I can remove the hard drive. I believe it is sata so if I can connect it to my computer I can then download all on to my HD and get new external. may have to take it to computer shop and ask the to remove the screws. will keep you updated

cheers
 


Hardware stores sell them
http://www.lowes.com/SearchCatalogDisplay?storeId=10151&langId=-1&catalogId=10051&N=0&newSearch=true&Ntt=torx

http://www.truevalue.com/catalog/search.cmd?form_state=searchForm&hardwarianState=1&keyword=torx&x=0&y=0

http://www.walmart.com/search/search-ng.do?search_query=torx&ic=48_0&Find=Find&search_constraint=0
 

taisetu

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thanks, I will look around my local big stores here and take some details off what you have sent. I am in the uk so they must do the same here. I was originally waiting for the man who built my machine, but he is taking so long. I will go today to shopsspeak soon
cheers
 

holliern

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my husband found the screw driver bit at the local hardware store and I ordered a new case and fixed it today myself! go me!
 

taisetu

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excellent, I have ordered a screwdriver set. should arrive soon then I will take it from there. did you need the new case or was there anyway you could connect it to your computor to then drag the contents across to your main HD?
 

was it a SATA or IDE drive in there?

If its SATA taisetu can just plug it in(just like any other internal drive).
 

taisetu

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hi nukemaster. I have removed this hd from the case. it is a samsung HM250JI SATA. I have pluged it in as before, the hd is spinning, teh little blue light come son etc. it is a hd with a little circuitt board at one end, but I am not sure that that is part of the hd, maybe n iomega add on. so now, having tries it once more it abviously is not being recognized, so what do I have to do to connect this to my pc and see if I can access the data and drag it all across to my main hd?
 

taisetu

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hi hollie. I now have managed to get the hd out of the case. did yours have a little circuit board attached to one end. I do not think that it is part of the hd and is an iomega add on.
you said you got a new case for yours, what do you think was the problem that your hd was not being recognised by your computor?
any obsevations would be most welcome.
I tried once again to plug it in once I removed it from the case, it is spinning and the light come on on the circuit board, but still not recogniseing it
 

taisetu

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I have posted 3 pics at imageshack
http://img263.imageshack.us/i/iomegaconnected.jpg/
http://img856.imageshack.us/i/iomegadrive.jpg/
http://img13.imageshack.us/i/iomegadrive2.jpg/