Hi, I’m having a huge problem with my external drive and after searching for 2 days and not being able to find any solution that worked, I’m posting here.
I’ve had this hard drive for about a month and a half, and it’s used mainly for media, and is always on (while plugged into a desktop computer that is always on).
2 days ago, a notification popped up in my system tray saying that an .mp3 was corrupt and to run the check disk utility. I went to run check disk, but it said that it could not be run at this time, and would be run upon rebooting my computer. I rebooted my computer and once I was logged into Windows, the drive would not show up in My Computer and has no drive letter assigned to it. It also does not show up in the Disk Management console, but does show up in Device Manager and is correctly identified. I have tried to uninstall/re-install, power on/off, unplug from wall outlet, pretty much any solution I came across. (Also I know for sure that it is not the data cable, because I had the same problem with a different cable, and the cable that came with the HD worked with a different external HD) Afterwards, I plugged it into a different computer (a laptop), and it installed correctly and was assigned a drive letter and was accessible. It was disconnected later in the day.
Upon re-connecting it to the 2nd laptop computer, the same problem occurs, where it doesn’t show up in My Computer or Disk Management, but does show up in Device Manager. Same as on my desktop computer.
I already have over 500 gigs worth of media saved on this drive, and would like to be able to recover it, and still use the drive. I know the data is still there and intact from when the HD first worked on the laptop and all of my files were still there. If anyone has any type of solutions or something I’m not trying, please help me out.
WD MyBook Essential USB 3.0 Compatible (Product #: WDBACW0020HBK-01)
Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 3 on both the desktop and laptop computers.
Thanks in advance for any advice/help.
