Western Digital My Book Home Edition 500 GB USB Hard Drive Logo
Posted on Aug 10, 2009

External Sata Drive no longer recognized

One day my external drive stopped being recognized (500 GB Western Digital). Initial error was I/O input output error.It does show up in Device Manager as ''usb mass storage device''. I tried to reinstall driver and it says it is the same driver . I do not think it is a physical problem with the hard drive as when it is not plugged in to the usb port the green light is constant, yet when it is plugged in it switches from red to green intermittenly. I did think it could have been because of the case so I bought another external sata casing but the same problem still occurs.

When I try to boot up with the computer off the computer will hang.

I have 150 gbs of important data so would prefer to not reformat .

Any suggestions ?

Thanks !

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  • Contributor 51 Answers
  • Posted on Aug 31, 2009
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Joined: Aug 30, 2009
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My friend it sounds like your hard drive. I know thats not what you want to hear. But don't worry there is hope! You can have the data retrieved from your hard drive by using this online company which I highly recommend:
http://www.gillware.com/

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