I had a WD 2TB external drive which I transferred successfully to a USB 3.0 enclosure months ago. Then I moved and the drive has been packed away in the trunk of my car since.
I just got it out as I need some files on it, and when I hooked it up it didn't work: the computer recognized it as a CD drive or something... in Computer it would not show up or show up as just a drive letter ... in disk management it said No Media. I tried it on another PC too to no avail.
After much research, the most likely solution looked to be to get a new enclosure. So I did, but the drive still isn't working, but in a different way.
When I first hooked it up, all looked well: the system tray showed correct recognition of the drive and enclosure type/brand and installed the drivers successfully.
But the drive no longer shows up in Computer at all, and in disk management it now prompts me to initialize the disk, and has it marked as Unknown, Not Initialized.
I have spent all day trying to fix this problem, and have read a million threads on different sites and tried everything, to no consequence. I need the files on the drive, and have tried all of the following:
- booting in ubuntu and knoppix via cd - drive is not recognized
- every major app for this type of problem I saw recommended: seagate seatools, partition wizard, wd data lifeguard diagnostics, power data recovery, find and mount, a bunch of stuff on hiren's boot cd, test disk, etc.
In most cases, the drive was not recognized at all. In a couple instances it was, but no scans were successful - they would instantly say failed, or complete instantly showing no results.
The drive sounds fine when it is turned on/hooked to the pc: it sounds normal, spins like it should, no weird noises.
I have no idea what to do. The only thing left that I'm aware of is to initialize it (against most of the advice I read) and hope it then at least gets recognized by some of the recovery apps.
But I don't want to lose my data and this seems like an absolute last resort.
Help!
I just got it out as I need some files on it, and when I hooked it up it didn't work: the computer recognized it as a CD drive or something... in Computer it would not show up or show up as just a drive letter ... in disk management it said No Media. I tried it on another PC too to no avail.
After much research, the most likely solution looked to be to get a new enclosure. So I did, but the drive still isn't working, but in a different way.
When I first hooked it up, all looked well: the system tray showed correct recognition of the drive and enclosure type/brand and installed the drivers successfully.
But the drive no longer shows up in Computer at all, and in disk management it now prompts me to initialize the disk, and has it marked as Unknown, Not Initialized.
I have spent all day trying to fix this problem, and have read a million threads on different sites and tried everything, to no consequence. I need the files on the drive, and have tried all of the following:
- booting in ubuntu and knoppix via cd - drive is not recognized
- every major app for this type of problem I saw recommended: seagate seatools, partition wizard, wd data lifeguard diagnostics, power data recovery, find and mount, a bunch of stuff on hiren's boot cd, test disk, etc.
In most cases, the drive was not recognized at all. In a couple instances it was, but no scans were successful - they would instantly say failed, or complete instantly showing no results.
The drive sounds fine when it is turned on/hooked to the pc: it sounds normal, spins like it should, no weird noises.
I have no idea what to do. The only thing left that I'm aware of is to initialize it (against most of the advice I read) and hope it then at least gets recognized by some of the recovery apps.
But I don't want to lose my data and this seems like an absolute last resort.
Help!
