Help with a hard drive

[QLDKing(Brad)]

I have an external hard drive that has stopped working. Western Digital 3TB. I have swapped USB lead with one that I know is working, and swapped computers (both mac and PC). I purchased one of these https://www.jaycar.com.au/dual-2-5-3-5-sata-hdd-docking-station-usb-3-0/p/XC4697 but the hard drive does not have the pins. Anything else I can try?

 

[Derf]

Cheaper Hard drives have recently started to do this which really sucks. The old ones that just had a USB to Sata Adapater were great.
----------------------------
Software
----------------------------
Whack the Drive in a PC (and make sure it is physically spinning). Use Disk manager
https://www.isunshare.com/windows-10/7-ways-to-open-disk-management-in-windows-10.html

See if you can see a drive disconnect / connect when you plug the drive in (A refresh may be required when you disconnect / reconnect the media). If you can see the drive. you might of just corrupted the file system or similar.

----------------------------
Hardware
----------------------------

Over the years USB 3.0 micro female connectors have failed me as well. Some times you can slightly flex the cable to get it to work. Also the connector shown in your picture can actually be used by USB2.0 by plugging in a standard USB micro cable to the left hand side of the connector (Samsung Galaxy s5's do this).

If all else fails try a continuity test on the connectors (you may have to sacrifice a micro USB cable for this). to see if the connector is the issue or a USB to Sata Chip has decided to perish.

Let me know how you go!

 

[Kitman]

That looks a little like an eSATA connector, seems hard drive makers are now making external hard drives different from standard hard drives, this means no more removing from cases and putting into a desktop PC.

If you can hear the drive spinning then you may be able to save some data from it, you just need to know what part is broken. Easy way to see if it is spinning is either put your ear up to it when you apply power and see if you can hear it, else use a screwdriver like a stethoscope, put the metal end on the drive case and your ear on the hand grip and this will help to hear if the drive is spinning.

If it spins and you have another perfectly working drive with the same connectors on it then you can do a board swap but you also need to swap the microchip from the original board onto the new board so that the drive will work else you will cause more damage.

If the drive doesn't spin or you hear clicks and it shuts down then one or more of the heads are done and without a class 100 clean room and a donor drive there ain't much you can do yourself.

 

[MrX]

That's a crumby thing to do... makes the drive hard to reuse. I recently found out that some computer makers *cough apple* even solder a SSD chip on to the motherboard these days, gone are the days of taking your drive out of a dead machine to keep your data. Dead motherboard means data gone.

 

[Verb75]

Awe man, that really sucks Brad. How important is the data? Plenty of data restoration places around, but it can get costly.