WD My Passport Ultra External Drive Corrupted

[grizzlylar]

Last night I was using my WD My Passport Ultra connected to my laptop but had performance issues accessing files so disconnected it by pulling the cable out then reconnecting, as I have done lots of times in the past. Now I am unable to view the drive at all. So it appears I have corrupted the partition of the drive by not ejecting properly before disconnecting.

The drive is full of years of videos, documents, data, pictures and memories that I just cannot afford to lose.

When I plug it in my OS recognises it with the windows bleep and it is listed in device manager as USB Mass Storage however there is no drive letter mapped through Windows explorer.

If I use a different USB cable I get the same and if I use a different Win 7 laptop I also get the same so it is definitely the HDD

If I run diskpart list I can see it listed as Disk 2 and can select it but it lists as 0 KB. If I run Diskpart volume I can only see my onboard HDD Volumes. If I select Disk 2 and run list partition it says there are no partitions to show.

I'm not aware of any diskpart commands similar to chkdsk that I can run against Disk 2.

If I check disk management it's listed as Disk 2 unknown and prompts to initialise disk but when I do this it errors Virtual Disk Manager "The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error"

I have downloaded Easeus data recovery, Easeus partition manager and MiniTool partition manager and I can't get any of the software to recognise that the USB drive is plugged in. It only pickups up my two onboard laptop HDD's. I've also downloaded WD Lifeguard Diagnostics which does recognised the USB drive but lists as 0KB. When I run Quick test, Extended Test and View Test Result against the drive all "Pass" but I still can't access it and it shows as 0KB and "not available". I've tried installing WD Drive Utilities onto my laptop but for some reason it hangs on install or when it says it's finished it's not actually installed.

I know the data is still on it and I really don't want to format and lose years worth of memories. Can anyone recommend a process and piece of software I can use to recover?

Thanks,

Grizzly

 

[jumanji]

Hi grizzlylar,

Welcome to Seven Forums.

Not a good news but then I have to call a spade a spade.

The answer is simple. If no Data recovery software is able to see your drive, no DIY data recovery is possible.

Now I do not want to repeat. Just read this post and you will know the only costly solution/ proposition..

http://www.sevenforums.com/hardware-devices/398842-disk-2-unkown-not-initialized.html#post3269412

In your case you have to contact the WD Data Recovery Partners in EMEA region.

( You unknowingly got trapped and locked yourself out, buying a hardware encrypted Western Digital External drive.)

 

[grizzlylar]

Hi grizzlylar,

Welcome to Seven Forums.

Not a good news but then I have to call a spade a spade.

The answer is simple. If no Data recovery software is able to see your drive, no DIY data recovery is possible.

Now I do not want to repeat. Just read this post and you will know the only costly solution/ proposition..

http://www.sevenforums.com/hardware-devices/398842-disk-2-unkown-not-initialized.html#post3269412

In your case you have to contact the WD Data Recovery Partners in EMEA region.

( You unknowingly got trapped and locked yourself out, buying a hardware encrypted Western Digital External drive.)

Hi Juminji,

Thanks for the reply. I had seen your responses on previous posts during a search so glad you have been able to advise. Looks like I will need to send it off to a data recovery partner. That will be the last time I buy a WD and chip encrypted drive.

Thanks,

Grizzly.

 

[samuria]

If its lost the partitions you need partition recovery software there are lots of free ones like Partition Find and Mount — free partition recovery software its more specific than normal recovery

 

[RolandJS]

I have a wild idea. i wonder: The end-user buys an exact WD HD, installs all the necessary utilities coming with it, uses the exact password if one was used, reads & writes something, does a complete shutdown [not merely a restart]. During the shutdown, unplug the twin good WD HD and plug in the presently dorky WD HD, power up, and hope that the WD fully online fully operational software will open the problematic WD HD. If that happens, full image everything off of said WD HD onto any reliable external media such as a usb ext HD with no onboard/chip-level encryption via Macrium Reflect.

 

[jumanji]

If its lost the partitions you need partition recovery software there are lots of free ones like Partition Find and Mount — free partition recovery software its more specific than normal recovery

Give it a try . I would also be interested in the results.

"When Find & Mount tool does not work
Partition Find & Mount software is designed to find lost or deleted partitions in the most convenient way, however, it may not work if the file system on a partition or hard drive itself is severely damaged."

You will definitely know whether it is a partition loss or file system/hardware damage.

 

[grizzlylar]

If its lost the partitions you need partition recovery software there are lots of free ones like Partition Find and Mount — free partition recovery software its more specific than normal recovery

Samuria,

Thanks for the link. I have tried this software - it detects the drive but as 0kb and no partitions so I'm unable to mount or progress. Worth a try though.

Grizzly

 

[grizzlylar]

I have a wild idea. i wonder: The end-user buys an exact WD HD, installs all the necessary utilities coming with it, uses the exact password if one was used, reads & writes something, does a complete shutdown [not merely a restart]. During the shutdown, unplug the twin good WD HD and plug in the presently dorky WD HD, power up, and hope that the WD fully online fully operational software will open the problematic WD HD. If that happens, full image everything off of said WD HD onto any reliable external media such as a usb ext HD with no onboard/chip-level encryption via Macrium Reflect.

Hi RolandJS,

That is quite wild but thanks for the suggestion.

I did not use or like any of the proprietary software on my faulty WD HDD when I bought it - I just formatted it then used it as an unencrypted removable HDD so don't use the utilities, encryption or any passwords.

It must be the corruption or onboard encryption chip that is stopping it being detected or recovered by most of the DIY recovery software. However your idea may work but not sure if I want the expense of buying another WD and see it fail - I would think the HDD are distinguished in some way via a device ID otherwise that would be a massive back door fail on their "encryption" process?

Thanks,

Grizzly.

 

[grizzlylar]

This paper on WD HDD encryption flaws is quite interesting:

http://eprint.iacr.org/2015/1002.pdf

 

[samuria]

Try other partition recovery software often one will work when others don't just Google it across is normally the best but the trial will tell you it's found it but you have to pay to recover which isn't bad as you know it will work

 

[RolandJS]

"...I did not use or like any of the proprietary software on my faulty WD HDD when I bought it - I just formatted it then used it as an unencrypted removable HDD so don't use the utilities, encryption or any passwords. .." Ahhhhhhh, that might be it. I did that also with a 1TB ext usb WD Passport Ultra. Got away with it - for awhile. Suddenly, no more read, no more write. Took it back to Frys' Electronics, told them truthfully what I had done and why [for me - backup/restore purposes], they refunded.
Remember, my wild idea will work financially if you keep the items and the packing in as pristine condition as possible along with keeping the receipts.