After some testing, I think the USB adapter in my WD 3TB Elements drive (WD30EZRX) has been fried.
The drive symptoms are that when I connect it to my computer via USB the light comes on and the disk seems to spin but it’s not recognised by the PC (Windows 8.1). I took a look under Disk Management and it doesn’t appear there and also ran Diskpart from a Command Prompt, also without it being recognised.
As I couldn’t help playing around with the drive a bit more, I’ve since removed the WD external case, removed the USB and power connecting board and connected it up to my PC via a SATA cable. You can see pics here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/129404453@N02/sets/72157650245608421/
When I then turn on my computer, the drive is found and shown as the E drive, however it’s shown as RAW and I can’t access it without formatting it. I was thinking of formatting it while it’s connected via SATA then attempting to get some of the files back using a recovery tool but was advised against this as I was told the USB adapter encrypts the drive.
That’s a long way of getting to my question: if I get another USB adapter and replace the current one on my WD drive, will the content still be encrypted or will I be able to access it?
If I will be able to access the content using this method, does anyone know where to get replacement WD USB adapters? I tried eBay, PCBsolution.com and hddzone.com, but nobody had the right parts.
Thanks in advance for any advice.