Thread: External Hard Drive Failure - Help Please!!

I've got an external drive, a Seagate something or other, that has apparently been overloaded with porn and given up the ghost.

From start-up with the drive connected my PC gets hung-up and seems to freeze before it boots.

I can start it as per normal with the drive disconnected but if I try to reconnect it following this the system seems to initially recognise a USB device has been connected (that little tune plays) but the drive itself never appears following that.

Any ideas?

It's a 250GB 'FreeAgent Go' if that makes any difference.

IS this a good time to sternly tell you to always back up everything at least twice?

Originally Posted by kingwilly

IS this a good time to sternly tell you to always back up everything at least twice?

Ummm, nope.

I don't think there's ever a good time for that.

Besides, it was my back-up.

well, I was gonna offer some words of sympathy, but since you tricked me on the DrBobs consistency thread I aint know! so $#%^#t4 you!

*snigger*

** a trip to Pantip, or Chiang Mai's equivalent may be in order, often they can save everything., but do it soon instead of trying to fix it, that can make it worse!

Originally Posted by kingwilly

** a trip to Pantip, or Chiang Mai's equivalent may be in order, often they can save everything., but do it soon instead of trying to fix it, that can make it worse!

Yeah you're probably right (actually we have a Pantip here now too).

Annoyingly it's got all my downloaded torrent files on it, plenty of movies I haven't watched yet. I was a little concerned that they'd dob me in or something but I expect it's nothing they haven't already seen.

Originally Posted by baldrick

easiest way is to pull the drive and plug into a spare IDE or sata channel on your desktop - added bonus of this is you can see if it shows up in BIOS on computer boot.

Easy you say...

I think I've failed to impress with what a computer idiot I am. What's an IDE? Do I even have one let alone a spare?? :?

Ant has a porn drive problem = so what, buy some KY, that will make it slide better more.

When this happened to me last time, I think it was Melvbot that recommended a program to me called Disk Warrior.

I've got the mac version but I'm not sure there's a p.c equivalent. Its worth a google though just in case. It sorted mine out straight away and I got all my shit back.

^^Cheers FP, will have a look for that.

I hark back to my orginal advice,

TAKE IT TO PANTIP BEFORE YOU FUCK IT UP WORSE!

Those clowns can loose shit just as easily and its more annoying.

Me - 'So you can recover everything on the hard drive?'

Clown - 'Yes'

Me - 'Just to double check, you can recover everything?'

Clown - 'Sure, no problem'

4 hours later

Me - 'Where's all my shit?'

Clown - 'Oh, I think better we format the hard drive'

Sounds like the caddy (enclosure) is fucked, had similar issue with a 2.5" external, new caddy and shes apples again.

Just for shits and giggles, do you have a secondary USB lead you could use, could be a dodgy lead.

Just for shits and giggles, do you have a secondary USB lead you could use, could be a dodgy lead.

Unfortunately no. It's an odd one too, has to USB plugs: one for power and one for power and data.

Thanks for the tips though.

Originally Posted by The Fresh Prince

Me - 'So you can recover everything on the hard drive?'

Clown - 'Yes'

Me - 'Just to double check, you can recover everything?'

Clown - 'Sure, no problem'

4 hours later

Me - 'Where's all my shit?'

Clown - 'Oh, I think better we format the hard drive'

classic

^Cheers for the offer, very kind and appreciated, but I'm in Chiang Mai.

It sounds similar to those wanky WD Passport ones that I've got. Try connecting it to another PC and wiggle the leads about a bit. Also reboot your PC and then try it.

It's probably not getting enough power to drive it.

^I did try it on my laptop at work today but no joy there either. Ditto the reboots (tried several).

I have the same problem sometimes,

make sure you logon first and wait a bit, and then plug it

doing a reboot with the device attached to it does have strange side effects sometimes

Originally Posted by AntRobertson

I think I've failed to impress with what a computer idiot I am

Originally Posted by kingwilly

TAKE IT TO PANTIP BEFORE YOU FUCK IT UP WORSE!

Originally Posted by The Fresh Prince

Clown - 'Oh, I think better we format the hard drive'

which is what is likely to happen

Originally Posted by AntRobertson

It's an odd one too, has to USB plugs: one for power and one for power and data.

so it is a laptop drive and not a desktop one - you would need an adapter for it to be plugged into a desktop internally.

you need someone who has some skill and who really understands english - the basics are not that hard to do if you have a desktop to use and can follow instructions

Originally Posted by baldrick

so it is a laptop drive and not a desktop one - you would need an adapter for it to be plugged into a desktop internally.

you need someone who has some skill and who really understands english - the basics are not that hard to do if you have a desktop to use and can follow instructions

Sorry, don't think I explained it very well (typo didn't help either).

I have had it running/attached to my desktop, the cable itself has three plugs - 1 that goes into the drive; and 2 that go into USB ports on my PC (1 marked "power" and 1 marked "power & data").

Originally Posted by Marmite the Dog

^ You could also try a new lead. A single USB should work if the USB port on the PC is giving out enough power (laptops seem better ime in this regard).

Will give that a go. I do have another lead for my PSP that fits. Already tried it on the desktop with no joy (seemingly not enough power), but will give it a crack on my laptop.

Feck I really hope I can salvage this! It's got a stack of movies and TV series on it that I really wanted to see!!

Is it plugged in?

Paperweight is the only decent use for a Seagate hard drive. Pure crap.