WD My book Essential 1TB

[IvanN1]

Hi, I am just enquiring about my "Western Digital" My Book Essential 1TB external harddrive.
I am unable to view any of the data on the device. Under computer management it says "unallocated"
and in device manager it appears when i plug the device into my PC via USB. Its spinning fine and
sounds OK and there is no burning smell.

Are you able to advise if it could be one of the options below:

- PCB Board?
- Controller Board?
- Windows 7 OS?
- Could it be because the Controller Board is Encrypted to 1 PC Only??

 

[RealBeast]

Sadly, this is a common issue with USB HDDs.

First check disk management to see if you can assign the drive a new drive letter.

I would then try the free version of EaseUS Partition Master for a partition recovery. You can download it HERE.

 

[IvanN1]

Hi Thanks for ur reply. I am unable to assign a letter drive to the external HDD. Also i rather not format the device as i want my data. I recieved a quote of 1600 for data recovery. The device is working fine. spinning fine. no burning smell. It worked on my Vista PC but when plugging it into Windows 7 machine it stopped working. Could it be USB ports ? Drivers ? ANy other solutions ?

 

[RealBeast]

Right, so try the quick partition recovery option of Partition Master to repair the partition, it does not format the drive or alter the data.

You can try other ports, etc. but usually when the drives read as unallocated the partition data is corrupted.