I purchased a WD Elements 1 TB external hard drive about a year ago. At the time, I only had a linux desktop (ubuntu), and the hard drive worked very well with it. I was always able to open and save files to it, and it was free of any problems. Recently I purchased a Samsung laptop that uses Windows 7 as its operating system. I took the hard drive, plugged in the power to the wall outlet, and connected the USB cable to the laptop. Immediately, a message came up that said I need to format the hard drive in order to use it with Windows 7. Because I have many very valuable files on the hard drive, and I wanted no part of formatting, I unplugged it from the laptop. A couple days then went by, and I decided to plug the hard drive back into the old Linux to save some files to it from that. When I did so, a message came up that said the hard drive wasn’t compatible and wouldn’t open, or something to that effect. My goal is to simply be able to access those files somehow, and I have no idea how. Please keep in mind that I’m in a way “technologically disabled”, and a complete computer novice. I don’t know how to use the command line, or anything of that nature to solve the problem. Formatting the hard drive isn’t an option, until the files are safe on either another hard drive or a computer. Any suggestions?
Thank you very much to anyone that can provide some help here!
Charlie Wood
