Hard drive suddenly disappeared from Windows Explorer

Iamazn · 27 Mar 2015

About 3 weeks ago, my 3TB seagate drive suddenly 'disappeared' from Windows Explorer. I rebooted and it reappeared. Sometimes when I copied files over to the drive, my computer would suddenly freeze, forcing me to reset the computer.

Today the 3TB seagate drive disappeared again. Rebooting didn't make it reappear. The BIOS shows that it is connected but Explorer AND Disk Management do not see it.

I downloaded Seatools for Windows but when I run it, my computer freezes. Seatools DOS version does not work either. When I boot Seatools DOS, it just stays at the FreeDOS screen.
How is it possible for a hard drive to freeze my computer when it is accessed? My OS is on a working SSD. Any advice on what I should do?

jumanji · 27 Mar 2015

Try these:

Reseat the power and SATA cable of the drive.

Change to a different power and SATA cable.

Change to a different SATA port.

Have you downloaded the new SeaTools for DOS SeaToolsDOS223ALL.ISO from SeaTools for DOS | Seagate and burnt it to a CD?

If not do it and try.

Iamazn · 27 Mar 2015

jumanji said:

Try these:

Reseat the power and SATA cable of the drive.

Change to a different power and SATA cable.

Change to a different SATA port.

Have you downloaded the new SeaTools for DOS SeaToolsDOS223ALL.ISO from SeaTools for DOS | Seagate and burnt it to a CD?

If not do it and try.

Yes. Seatools for DOS shows "No hard drives detected" in both AHCI mode ans IDE mode.

RolandJS · 27 Mar 2015

Jumanji, are there tests for the motherboard? I'm wondering if motherboard stuff that talks to HD could be beginning to fail.

jumanji · 27 Mar 2015

Iamazn said:

.....Yes. Seatools for DOS shows "No hard drives detected" in both AHCI mode ans IDE mode.

That means SeaTools did run and you got into the first Window and not stuck in FreeDOS screen as you indicated in your first post. That does not sound good.

If you had tried the other three suggestions without success, then make one last attempt to try and access the drive with a live Linux pen drive. If that fails, talk to Seagate support who may suggest an RMA if under warranty.

Check this post to create a bootable Lucid Puppy pen drive . How to recover data if computer ia showing "no operating system found"

(I have also seen your post in Bleeping Computers. That is acceptable. There you were advised to use Parted Magic and test your drive. Have you done that?)

EDIT: @RolandJS, I do not know anyway of testing the motherboard. At the most the service personnel will take out the HDD from the user's PC and try it on another working computer. If the OP wants to try his HDD on another working computer, he may do so.