digler Posted January 16, 2016 Report Share Posted January 16, 2016 I have a WD 1TB HDD that seems to have stopped working. When I plug it in I hear the connected noise and the drive letter shows up in my computer. This is about as far as I can go with it, the light on the HDD is constantly flashing, when I click on the drive letter or right click on it, it just hangs there. In disk management I can not see the drive, all I get is connecting to virtual disk service... I have left the HDD fr a few hours hoping that it was reading but still nothing. I have also downloaded WD diagnostic toll but the HDD doesnt even show up as being connected. I am using Window 7 on a laptop and windows 10 on a desktop. Both with the same issue Any thoughts on how I can fix this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Irene Posted January 17, 2016 Report Share Posted January 17, 2016 Have you tried looking/asking here?: https://community.wd.com/c/wd-external-drives Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boris Posted January 17, 2016 Report Share Posted January 17, 2016 Is this an external hard drive (3.5") with its own power supply or a USB powered (2.5") drive ? (3.5") Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digler Posted January 18, 2016 Author Report Share Posted January 18, 2016 Have posted this on WD community page but no response yet This is a USB powered HDD. It was originally plugged into the back of my PC and was shared on my network. I noticed I no longer had access to it and then I have been trying it on different machines and ports. This was working for some time but has decided to stop now I have replaced the cable but this has not helped. I have also tried this on 2 PC's at work running on Windows 7 with the same issue. It seems to freeze things up and I cant shut the PC down without removing the HDD. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boris Posted January 18, 2016 Report Share Posted January 18, 2016 It sounds like the USB/power connector in the H/D enclosure has malfunctioned ? The actual drive itself is quite likely to be completely OK once it is removed from the enclosure and plugged into a PC internally. If so - you could then stick it in one of these enclosures :- Link - at very low cost Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digler Posted January 20, 2016 Author Report Share Posted January 20, 2016 After talking to our IT guy at work he came to the same conclusion. He suggested I buy another PCB to replace to old one but I'm a bit sceptical about this. I can get them easily but a lot of the sites mention swapping chips over because of the BIOS?? I was thinking of buying another HDD that is the same and try to swap the PCB over. Would this work as well? That way I have another HDD to replace the old one. Would the caddy in the link be suitable for my HDD? It is actually a WD My Passport 2TB drive. Model number WDBY8L0020BSL-01. The HDD inside is a WD20NMVW Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boris Posted January 20, 2016 Report Share Posted January 20, 2016 That caddy is only USB 2.0 ........ but you can get a decent USB 3.0 caddy for about a tenner. I've never had any problems putting H/Ds in a new caddy - probably done it 30+ times. Inside your case it looks like this :-Picture i presume your drive is not under warranty still ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digler Posted January 20, 2016 Author Report Share Posted January 20, 2016 From what I have read and seen on youtube these WD HDD needs this PCB to operate and can not be transferred to a caddy. I have also read people avoid buying these because of that reason. I can get a new PCB but the BIOS chips most likely need changing over which I dont think I can do myself. To pay someone to do it and the new PCB is more than a new HDD. The content is only media and not personal photo's so I may just write this one off :( Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boris Posted January 21, 2016 Report Share Posted January 21, 2016 Yes, they do seem to be particularly unreliable - never had to take one of these apart yet so can't comment on the PC replacement requirement. Personally, I'd just buy a new (standard) 2.5" H/D and put it in a decent USB 3.0 caddy = saves any further PCB faffing about I've got a couple of these for taking around :- LINK (dead easy to fit + 2 yr warranty) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digler Posted January 22, 2016 Author Report Share Posted January 22, 2016 Yeah I'm now thinking what and how to store my data on. Have been looking at some of the NAS drives... I have other HDD with valuable family photos and stuff so I want something more reliable and possibly with back up Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcoptimizer Posted July 13, 2016 Report Share Posted July 13, 2016 all i had to do was go to device manager -> under storage controllers selected the "USB Attached SCSI (UAS) Mass Storage Device" which comes up when i connect the drive -> right click and select update driver software ->browse my computer option -> let me pick ... option -> in the listed drivers i selected mass storage device and clicked OK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
computerbeing Posted July 19, 2016 Report Share Posted July 19, 2016 It would seem that your hard drive has bad sectors making it freeze Windows since it cannot read those sectors. I come to this conclusion since it is still recognised in Windows you may be able to salvage it. Do not swap PCB's. Even if you swap the ROM chip you have a very low chance of success since you will also need specialised software to deal with the firmware. Plus the donor drive that you need to find needs to be same model No and same firmware. What you should try first is to clone the drive to another one with some low level software such as ddrescue. Also the more you power up the drive the closer it get to dying completely and making data recovery very costly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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