Testing Damaged External HDD

[Guest]

I have a 3TB WD Elements External HDD that is no longer being recognized by my computer. I have tried it on another one as well in numerous USB ports but it's still not recognized, not even in disk management.

It is powered by an AC adapter and I know it is receiving power as I can hear fan/disk and the light is on. I pulled off the case, removed the control circuit board (the one that connects the HDD via SATA to the USB port and power cable). Now I am trying to connect the HDD using a SATA to USB 3.0 cable but I don't think it's being supplied enough power through the powered USB and isn't even turning on. The cable has SATA on one end and two male USB plugs on the other (One powered and one not). I tried connecting the powered plug to a USB power adapter and the other to my computer but it still didn't work.

Any ideas as to how I can connect my hard drive? Any other ways to diagnose problems with my hard drive? I would rather do it myself then pay someone else to do something I can figure out myself.I don't really care about the drive itself but would like to retrieve some of the data on it (I know, I know, I didn't back-up)

Thanks in advance!

 

[photonboy]

The two main options are:

1) use in a desktop PC with the proper SATA data and power cables, or

2) buy a USB3.0 enclosure from Vantec or other

I don't quite understand how you have it hooked up right now. You need power of course, but you also need a SATA cable going from the HDD to a computer motherboard unless you have a SATA-to-USB data device (to replace the board in the enclusure) that you know works.

 

[Guest]

So the last thing I tried was using a SATA to USB adaptor but that isn't working. The one linked below:

http://www.dx.com/p/cy-u3-067-usb-3-0-to-sata-22-pin-2-5-hard-disk-driver-adapter-cable-w-usb-power-cable-black-272022#.WpoZqXM7Y0M

I assume because it doesn't have an extra power source.

I don't have a desktop at the moment which is making it a bit difficult to test.

 

[Phillip Corcoran]

USB ports cannot provide sufficient power for a drive which requires the use of a mains power adapter which plugs in to a wall socket.

It's my belief the drive may have failed anyway, data retrieval will have to entrusted to a data recovery service if you have deep enough pockets.