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External Hard Drive Not Working.

chaoscow

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Posted May 23, 2012 at 1:26AM

Hi there, I've had this external for quite a while and I just use it for backup when i decide to reformat my computer or to store my photos on. It has been working fine until a few days ago it sometimes show as something been plugged into usb in the lower right hand corner but not alwyas. The hard drive keeps buzzing like "buzz....buzz....buzz....buzz....buzz" when plugged in and turned on. I tried a different computer and tried using a different encloser to a seperate external we have laying around. Neither worked.

Can it be repaired? If so how? I have some important financial information both personal and business.

Thanks!

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johndrew

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Posted May 23, 2012 at 10:25AM

They can be repaired, but if it is the HDD that has failed it will hardly be worth the effort. You could try the HDD in another caddy (enclosure) - they can be purchased empty - or fit it in a desktop to see if it works first.

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johndrew

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Posted May 23, 2012 at 10:27AM

Sorry meant to say. If it is the HDD that has failed there are companies that will recover the data where possible - at a cost.

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chaoscow

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Posted May 23, 2012 at 1:09PM

Ya like i said i've tried using a different enclosure. so how can they recover data off a broke hard drive?

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robinofloxley

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Posted May 23, 2012 at 1:28PM

Google hdd freezer trick. You may be lucky.

Recovery companies can save the data on the platters by taking the drives apart. But it's not cheap and no guarantee of success.

As you now know, backup drives are for backup, not a convenient large space.

Keep several copies of important files on different physical drives. DVDs and cloud services also useful.

Good luck. Sorry I can't suggest anything more positive.

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Fruit Bat /\0/\

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Posted May 23, 2012 at 4:01PM

Freezer trick is last resort

Plug it in does it come up as found USB device?

Does it show in device manager or more importantly disk management?

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