My Book Essential Edition has faulty power socket

Hi all.

I would like to say hello to all as this is my first post on this forum.

In June '07, I purchased a WD, “My Book Essential Edition” 500 Gig HD to use as a backup device. And as such, this drive has for most parts been left disconnected from the computer just sitting on my desk, and only connected when needed.

That said, today was one of those days. I connected the drive to find that the “on light” was not on. Occasionally it would flicker momentarily and then go out. All the usual suspects were checked and re checked.

Finally the only thing left to do was to take the drive and power source down to the garage and use my instruments and test the power supply and or the plugs. 

Well to cut a long story short the power supply and plugs were O.K., but what I did notice was that as I pushed in and pulled the 12 volt power plug into the drive, I would get momentarily light flickers.

The problem is obviously in the WD external drive “power socked” or wiring connected internally to that socket.

Now to my question, how to remove the external casing and gain access to the workings of the drive (other than hitting it with a hammer) as the casing appears to be sealed by either being glued or heat fused? :mansad:

Regards

.

There are no official instructions on how to dismantle this drive since is not an user serviceable unit.

However, you might find other post online and on this community with information on how to accomplish that.

Be advised that dismantling the drive will VOID the warranty.

Try looking on Youtube there is probably a video there. It sounds like the solder joint failed on the port for the power connector. They no longer use lead based solder and the fact the boards are mass produced does lead to failure more often today. You get it apart you might try having the power port soldered back on. Since this is an older drive I don’t know if it is hardware encrypted or not. The drives that come with Smartware are hardware encrypted by the board with the USB and poserconnectors.

Joe 

Thanks guys for your informatrion.

As I stated, the drive is well out of warranty, and as to the faulty soldering at the socket, that is what I am inclined to think also.

I will try You Tube and see how I go. If I have sucess I will post back.

Regards

Hi Guys, back again.

Well I found a number of good video clips on Youtube showing me how to gain access to the drive interior. This one is about the best:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkAMcMA_d3Q

I found another site that goes into a bit more detail as how to actually “crack” the clips but this one I found more helpful for my needs.

I then checked out eBay for the pricing of a connector board, as it looks like that is what I need and found the price as $54.11 with P & H at $11.90.

So it looks like I will be scrapping the External HD and salvaging the HD for later installing it into the PC. I cannot see the justification for spending $66.01 on a 500 Gig drive.

Thanks for the help.

Regards.