Hard drive not recoginized

[timrob]

My sister has a 2TB external hard drive connected via USB.  After she reloaded Vista, the computer doesn't fully recognize it.  The drive boots up and spins.  No weird sounds.  It appears in Device Manager with no problem.  Disk Management says it needs to be initialized.  It was working fine before she reloaded Vista.

My first thought is something is wrong with her computer and not the external drive.  I've asked her to check the drive on another computer.

She checked the drivers and they seem ok.  When she first installed it, Vista already had the drivers.  There was no need for a special CD or searching the internet.

If the problem ends up being the drive, I read some where that maybe it's just the MBR needs fixing.  Would I use disk check or maybe Disk Doctor or a similar program?  She has a lot of files on it and doesn't want to initialize and format the drive.

[jason2074]

What brand/model is the 2TB hard drive? How was the other computer recognizing the drive? Did you try looking for the removable device by opening up Windows explorer(My Computer)? Try using other USB ports. Also, you could try purchasing a Dual USB data cable or borrowing one. Had this problem before on a portable drive and the dual usb cable solved my issue. 

[patio]

Does Disk Management show it as RAW ? ?

[Transfusion]

unless you were trying to boot from the external hard drive I wouldn't recommend doing any partition info editing on the external hard drive, considering that Windows is not reading the partition properly. The MBR is the Master Boot Record which directs the system to boot from the drive in question.


http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk
[Testdisk] was primarily designed to help recover lost partitions... from the above website.[/size]
What you might be experiencing is a "lost partition," which can occur when the hard drive is plugged out during data transfer.

[timrob]

My sister tried it on another computer.  The same problem occured.  So it's the hard drive and not the computer.  She says she always safely ejected the drive and never dropped it.  She's dropping it off Wednesday.  I'll take a further look at it.

When she installed it on a new computer, the computer installed the driver, showed it in Device Manager and Disk Management, but it's not visible in Explorer. 

The drive is used for data storage.  It is not a boot drive.  It's not visible in Windows Explorer.  Other USB ports and cables were attempted.  It's a Western Digital Green wd10eacs-00zjb0.  I have several other WD Green's that haven't had a problem, except the one I dropped.  There was not a known virus problem.

What is a dual USB cable?

Disk management shows it needs to be initialized, not RAW.  I've initialized new drives before.

Should I use TestDisk instead of chkdsk?

[jason2074]

My sister has a 2TB external hard drive connected via USB

If this drive was designed as an internal(SATA/IDE) but instead being use mainly as a portable drive by enclosure, I would seek first connecting it by designed to retrieve the documents.

[timrob]

It was an IDE drive. I don't see how that has anything to do with it not working, but I will try it as an IDE drive. It was working fine before, sat on the shelf, then stopped working. Maybe ESD shock.

[jason2074]

It was an IDE drive

You still have an option.  The first priority here is to recover the files. If it happens that everything went fine by connecting it internally, create a backup plan sooner. It has to be power issue on the enclosures, hopefully. Good Luck!

[timrob]

Ehh, enclosure? I'm a cheap azz. I gave her one of those cheap cables that power the HD. They aren't the most reliable. That gives me some more ideas.  The IDE to USB cable could be upside down.

[Transfusion]

testdisk provides partition recovery options, which are probably useful in this case....


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812232002

Ehh, enclosure? I'm a cheap azz. I gave her one of those cheap cables that power the HD. They aren't the most reliable. That gives me some more ideas.  The IDE to USB cable could be upside down.

Something like the above link, you mean? you can't put IDE cables in upside down...


I just remembered I had a similar problem with a USB flash drive-wouldn't show up in explorer but was recognized by device manager. I solved it by assigning a drive letter to the drive.


http://tips4pc.com/format%20your%20computer/how_to_label_a_new_hard_drive_or.htm

[timrob]

Yes, that's the type of cable.  If I remember correctly, one of them you can insert upside down.

I talked to my sister some more.  She talked to her kids, and come to find out their youngest did knock the hard drive and it fell to the floor.  You never know with kids.  If we're able to recover the files, I'll replace the hard drive and make a backup.

I should be able to check the drive tonight.  There's a guy a work that has some kind of super-secret software.  He's recovered a failed flash drive for me in the past.  If things are really bad, I'll send it out to recover the data.  It's all of her family photos.  There's no backup.  Any suggestions for companies that can recover data?

[patio]

Super -secret ? ? ...Be sure to update us on that...

[timrob]

Yeah, he's like that.  Weird.

I looked at the drive.  The only thing that would come up was Device Manager.  Disk Management and TestDisk would not see the drive.

Since the files are irreplaceable, I'll look into a hard drive recovery companies.  I've already found a few.

Thanks for everybody's help.