Disc Not recognized

[Xatris]

Hello there, I have a Western Digital Elements portable hard drive with a ton of important info on it, and I need to add more soon.  Recently, the disc has not been recognized on my computer, and I have also tried with a different one with the same result.  It has been a couple of days since I have contacted customer support, but I need a solution ASAP so I can continue working on projects.  Is it something as simple as replacing the cord?  I don't think so because I just got this hard drive a couple of months ago and I am using the included cable.  

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated, Thanks!

 

PS the disc does turn on.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Does the drive spin up?

 

A different cable is good to try here.

 

Could be a bad drive.

 

Looks like time to restore backups.

[NoRomanBatmansAllowed]

If the cable doesn't work and your really need that info, it might be a good idea to replace the HDD's PCB.

 

Ebay is a good place to find them, but make sure to get the exact same model.

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, bob51zhang said:

If the cable doesn't work and your really need that info, it might be a good idea to replace the HDD's PCB.

 

Ebay is a good place to find them, but make sure to get the exact same model.

If you need the data you should send it to a data recovery service. The board may not be the issue and doing this your self is a great way to make the data much harder to get.

 

Also you can't often just change the board. You need to swap the rom chip aswell.

[KarathKasun]

Just had someone lose all of their stuff here too.

 

Here is the important thing to take from this scenario if you do or do not get your data back...

 

Keep multiple backups of important data.  A cloud backup works, but physical copies in different physical locations is best.

[kirashi]

41 minutes ago, bob51zhang said:

If the cable doesn't work and your really need that info, it might be a good idea to replace the HDD's PCB.

Ebay is a good place to find them, but make sure to get the exact same model.

DO NOT swap Western Digital external hard drive PCB's unless you want to destroy your data forever. As @Electronics Wizardy has noted below, unless you also de-solder the ROM chip from the old board and move it to the new board, data on the drive will remain encrypted and only readable by the original (but probably dead) PCB due to the use of hardware encryption keys on these WD portable / external drives. Or it may corrupt itself if you do try swapping the PCB's to protect the data on the drive. This is why I will never buy another external WD drive ever again - makes retrieving files from the drive impossible, let alone trying to repair it.

38 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

If you need the data you should send it to a data recovery service. The board may not be the issue and doing this your self is a great way to make the data much harder to get.

Also you can't often just change the board. You need to swap the rom chip aswell.

I second this thought - sending it to a data recovery service before it becomes worse is your best bet, but keep in mind if they find that the board is the defective part, only WD will be able to service it, so you'll have to send the drive to them anyway. This is why I follow the 3-2-1 backup rule at all times, or just don't care about data I can deal with losing. https://www.backblaze.com/blog/the-3-2-1-backup-strategy/