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WD Passport USB only hard drive not respondin

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J. - Aug 22, 2011 at 11:06 PM
 sathis - Mar 5, 2016 at 08:00 AM
Have a WD "My Passport" 500GB hard drive that has only 1 led, the light is on, but no one is home. It is a simple USB external drive, and it is spinning when plugged in, but not recognized. Have tried multiple computers, multiple USB ports on my laptop. I was listening to music, during that time. I shut down windows player. And since then, my hard drive under my computer is not there. I have been doing research for the past few days. I have seen that it is possible to swap the case with a generic one and see if that works. I am pretty computer savy, and have no problem following instructions. But I have not done anything like this before. Not too worried about replacing, but as everyone else I have read says, worried about the data inside. Many things I would like to salvage if possible? Any direction at this point would be great. As far as chkdsk, or looking at device manager, I have not found anything that might suggest that it is recognized. If I could just be led in the right direction, I would appreciate any assistance on this! Thank in advance for anyones help!

Running Win 7 on my laptop currently and device manager help would also be appreciated! Thank you again!
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bionik
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Aug 23, 2011 at 12:53 AM
Hello,

Check first if your WD Passport drive is detected by your BIOS at the start up.

If it is the case, try this:

Click on Start --> Run ---> type diskmgmt.msc and click on OK.

Right-click on WD Passport Drive --> Select "Change Drive Letter and Paths..." --->

Click on "Add" button ---> Select your drive letter and click on OK.

Note : If the drive letter is already assigned, then try changing the drive letter

by clicking on "Change" button instead of "Add" button in the above step.

Good Luck!
1
sathis
Mar 5, 2016 at 08:00 AM
I try ur following steps but its not woking
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Answer 2 / 2
J
Aug 23, 2011 at 11:31 AM
bionik,

Did everything you suggested, but BIOS is not recognizing my HD at this point as it is NOT in that list after following your instructions. Any other steps I might be able to do, OR at least get the data out even if the drive is done? Thanks for any assitance all!!

Jason
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J
Aug 23, 2011 at 11:37 AM
Also, if I did not mention before. The drive is spinning as I can feel that. The single white led is lit solid, but not flashing. Again, there is obviously power getting to it. I have not tried it on a few friends computers to no avail. Wondering if at this point, since it is NOT recognized on multiple computers, if I might be able to try the double USB cable method to see if I can get a little more power to have it be recognized, or if the drive is just done?! IF the drive is done, is there a chance to have the data removed? Thank you all again for any assistance in this!
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bionik
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Aug 23, 2011 at 04:19 PM
I'm sorry to tell you this but your drive crashed and I'm afraid that data can not be recoverable. I'm sorry.
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