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Cannot access External HDD

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Hello,

I am kind of in a fix with my external HDD. My sister tried backing up quite a few movies together and I am not too sure what exactly happened. Its a WD 1TB HDD. I tried connecting it to different laptops and the issue is the same. The Hard Drive does not show up in my computers. It is there in the device manager and everything but I can't access the files and folders inside and neither can I put anything in. I can also eject the device from the task bar like any other USB device. I have a quite a lot of things in the hard drive and I am too scared to mess around randomly with it just in case. Could anyone please help me out?

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Hey there, MaishaM.

Sorry to hear about the issues you're experiencing with your HDD. :\
Have you had any other problems with it before this happened? Any unusual sounds/noises coming from the drive, unusual transfer speed, freezing/hanging the system when you connect it? Did you use any specific program to backup the files or was it a simple copy - paste?

Would you be so kind as to post a screenshot of what you see in Disk Management when you have the drive connected to the computer?
I'd recommend that you try the HDD with a different USB cable (preferably not longer than 12"-18") as well, to see if the issue still persists.

Please let me know how it goes.
Boogieman_WD
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Thanks for getting back to me. I hadn't had any other problems before. However, this happened while transferring quite a large number of movies into the drive. I wasn't using any other software, just simple copy and paste. The hard drive did hang in the process of the transfer which did not complete and I have been experiencing the problem since that time. I don't have a screen shot at the moment since I ended up giving the HDD over to someone more tech savvy for some help. In the computer management when I had the HDD connected it asked to have the disk allocated. Also the HDD appeared at the bottom where it said the disk is unallocated. I did use different cables and the problem was still there.
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Hmm, showing the drive's partition as unallocated is not good news. However, there are numerous reasons for a partition to be become corrupted: it might have been damaged because of issues with the drive, or if it has been disconnected in the middle of data transfer, or by a virus, or by corrupted data, etc. If the problem is not drive related, then at least you should be able to reformat it and use it afterwards.
However since you do need the data on it, I'd advise you against doing that just yet. First you should try to recover your information. I'd recommend that you try accessing the drive via Ubuntu Live USB/DVD, to see if the partition is properly recognized and if you can get to your files. Other than that, you could try with data recovery software, to see if you have any luck with it. And last, but not least, if nothing else works for you and/or if the data is really important to you, you can go for a professional solution, such as a data recovery company: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=UYCsuT

Please keep me updated.
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I was able to get the data retrieved but the hard drive is no longer usable. Thanks for the help though, much appreciated. :)
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I see. At least that's pretty good news, sorry for your drive though. :\

You can get in touch with the vendor you got the drive from, if it's still under warranty, to see if you'd be able to RMA it.
Another options would be to check its warranty status with WD by using this link: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=SHM6VF and file for an RMA procedure via the support portal: http://products.wdc.com/support/kb.ashx?id=5RKIIF

Please let me know if there's anything else I can help you with.
Good luck!
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