WDC My Passport Ultra 2TB not recognized by Windows 7 (sort of)

[Subtox]

I have a WDC My Passport Ultra 2TB external USB 3 drive plugged into a USB 2 port on my Windows 7 PC, which has been working fine since October. The other day it fell off my desk but has continued to work with no problems since then. However, today I went to copy some large files to it and kept getting errors that the disk wasn't available. I could still read files though. At one point when I tried to delete an unfinished file it locked up explorer completely and I (foolishly, I now realize) unplugged it. Since then it does not even get a drive letter when I plug it in and is only recognized as a generic "Disk Drive" in Device Manager. In Devices and Printers it is recognized as a "My Passport 0830". I can sometimes see it as an unallocated partition in Computer Management > Storage > Disk Management, but when I try to do anything with it I get a message that the device is not ready.

I have tried uninstalling the driver in Device Manager and letting it re-recognize it, but I get the same thing -- either it successfully installs the driver or fails installing, but either way there is no drive letter assigned. I have tried it on another PC and tried using a known good USB 2 cable. I have downloaded WD Drive Utilities and it recognizes the drive (on the other PC but not mine) but there is only the option to erase all files, which probably won't work anyway but I don't want to even consider that option until any hope of retrieving the data is exhausted. I have also used HD Sentinel, Recuva and some other utilties but none of them even sees the drive.

It seems I have tried a million things in all different sequences so if you have any specific questions about what I've done please ask. And ultimately, any ideas you might have are appreciated. If all else fails then I can try to RMA the drive but I'd really rather not do that as i don't have backups of everything on it. Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[Darkbreeze]

The enclosure electronics may have been damaged. You're only course of action regarding recovery of the files and any possible further use of the drive may be to try and remove the drive and connect it to the motherboard (If you have a desktop) or install it into another enclosure (If you have only a laptop). Clearly connecting it by SATA cable directly to the motherboard is the better option since no investment in other hardware is involved. Enclosure electronics are generally more delicate than the drive itself, but damage to the drives heads or platters is always a possibility with a drop of any kind.

At the very least this will tell you if it is, or is not, related to the enclosure or is in fact an issue with the drive itself. All external drives contain a regular 2.5" or 3.5" drive that can be connected via SATA to your motherboard. If you have a laptop you may even be able to simply swap it for the drive that's installed now, at least to see if it's properties come up in the BIOS which may at least tell you that it's actually working or not.