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External HDD randomly disconnecting

StingBull
By StingBull
in Storage Devices
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I'm having a problem with my WD 500 GB external drive. Whenever I'm transfering a file from it it randomly loses connection, terminating the transfer. Do you think this is caused by some virus or the hard drive is just dying? It is a couple of years old.

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could be your drive, your circuit board that converts sata to usb  or it could be your power supply for the external hdd.
I'd say try a different power brick, if that doesn't work, pull out the drive if it's no longer under warranty and connect it internally to your pc or get a different sata to usb converter.

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I've had this happen and it was the cable, needed to replace it.

For HDD diagnosis, you can use CrystalDisk, check its SMART data.

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could be your drive, your circuit board that converts sata to usb  or it could be your power supply for the external hdd.

I'd say try a different power brick, if that doesn't work, pull out the drive if it's no longer under warranty and connect it internally to your pc or get a different sata to usb converter.

 

Actually it's powered through USB, forgot to mention that.

The stone cannot know why the chisel cleaves it; the iron cannot know why the fire scorches it. When thy life is cleft and scorched, when death and despair leap at thee, beat not thy breast and curse thy evil fate, but thank the Builder for the trials that shape thee.
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I've had this happen and it was the cable, needed to replace it.

For HDD diagnosis, you can use CrystalDisk, check its SMART data.

 

I did try a different cable and had the same result. I'll try the diagnosis.

The stone cannot know why the chisel cleaves it; the iron cannot know why the fire scorches it. When thy life is cleft and scorched, when death and despair leap at thee, beat not thy breast and curse thy evil fate, but thank the Builder for the trials that shape thee.
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I did try a different cable and had the same result. I'll try the diagnosis.

Start> control panel > Power Options > Change Plan settings > Change Advanced power settings > Usb Settings > Usb selective suspend setting to disable.

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Start> control panel > Power Options > Change Plan settings > Change Advanced power settings > Usb Settings > Usb selective suspend setting to disable.

 

I'll try that as well although I don't see why Windows would suspend a connection during a file transfer.

The stone cannot know why the chisel cleaves it; the iron cannot know why the fire scorches it. When thy life is cleft and scorched, when death and despair leap at thee, beat not thy breast and curse thy evil fate, but thank the Builder for the trials that shape thee.
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i suspect it could be the usb connection head at HDD end

 

it only has a small solder to the circuit board which converts from USB to SATA

 

with frequent insert and removal, that head will break off

 

so i suggest getting a new HDD cage for the drive

 

thats what I did with my Seagate FreeAgent Go

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try a new cable especially if its micro usb 3.0

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try a new cable especially if its micro usb 3.0

well he swap the cable but same problem so i suspect its the connection head on the HDD drive has failed

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well he swap the cable but same problem so i suspect its the connection head on the HDD drive has failed

plssibly if yo udont have warranty or want to try and get the data off pull the drive from the enclosure and just connect it directly using SATA or eSATA. If you have a 2.5in Western digital drive your out of luck as they have a USB controller right on board to make them smaller instead of using a laptop HDD and a enclosure that goes SATA to USB.

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plssibly if yo udont have warranty or want to try and get the data off pull the drive from the enclosure and just connect it directly using SATA or eSATA. If you have a 2.5in Western digital drive your out of luck as they have a USB controller right on board to make them smaller instead of using a laptop HDD and a enclosure that goes SATA to USB.

you mean the recent one like the My passport series?

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you mean the recent one like the My passport series?

Yep

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Yep

will have to be careful with mine then

 

thanks for the headsup

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will have to be careful with mine then

thanks for the headsup

NP

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