Seagate 2TB problem:inaccessible,ask for initialize,incorrect capacity

Hello everyone,

My external HDD (Seagate Expansion Drive 2TB) became inaccessible today. Bought it around 3 years ago and works fine until today.

The things I did before disassemble:

• Change USB cable
• try other USB slot
• try connect to other computer (my macbook)

none of them works.

I decided to disassemble the drive (since the warranty is expired), take it off from the enclosure, and connect it directly to my mobo via SATA.

It can be seen in Device Manager, but in Disk Management it asks for initialize and show wrong capacity (show only 128GB).





with Seatools, Short DST pass but failed on Short Generic test. Drive Information on Seatools shows only 4 GB.




Tried TestDisk, but since it showed incorrect size, I didn't proceed further.




Mini Tool Partition Wizard shows bad disk. Didn't proceed with the scan though.




Is there any chance to get my data back? Or any suggestion what should I do next? Any help will be appreciate.

So sorry for my poor English, and since this is my 1st thread, I might accidentally break some rules here. Please apologize.

Thank you in advance.

Hi Jumanji, thank you very much for the reply.

Yeah, this morning when I turn on my PC, the drive cannot be detected by BIOS. It keeps clicking and when I proceed to windows it stuck on "Starting Windows". I'll take it to the recovery service and see if they could save my data.

Umm, about the truly professional thing, is there any clue to know if the recovery service is a truly professional or not? Last time I went to a recovery service (my Seagate Backup Plus 3TB failed around 8 months ago - PCB burned), they don't have the PCB and asked me to find an identical HDD for PCB swap (just like your suggestion). However, I couldn't find it and at the end I gave up on that drive.

Also, I planned to buy a new internal SATA drive around 3 - 4TB. Is there any suggestion for the brand/type? Since I had 2 failed Seagate drives right now, I think I'll go with WDC. Please advise.

Thank you very much.

Hi MightyMiroWD,

Thanks for the suggestion. Yeah, I'll try to find a professional data recovery here. Hopefully the data could be saved.

Thanks !

MightyMiroWD said:

Hi twinklestar!

I hope you get all the data back from the drive!

However, I noticed your question about WD internal drives and since I'm a WD representative I decided to give you some information about the different models.

WD Blue is a regular everyday drive that is most commonly used for regular computing, light gaming and workloads and it's often combined with SSD. It is fully capable to run most games as well as many programs for editing or programming.

Support Answers

WD Black is a performance oriented drive and it has good features, such as a built-in dual-core CPU, that makes the drive suitable for multitasking. It is designed for heavy gaming, big workloads and intensive file usage and comes with a 5-year limited warranty.

Support Answers

WD Red is the NAS/RAID drive designed for RAID environments and NAS in particular. It is tuned and optimized for 24/7 performance, so it's often used for backups and stable secondary storage as well.

Support Answers

Cheers and feel free to ask any questions you may have!

How about the green? I have used 2 WD green 2TB since around 6-7 years ago and working fine until now. Only 1 partition got corrupted around 2 years ago (you can see it in my disk management screenshot on post 1) but I recovered all the data successfully.

I use my PC for audio work which need a lot of space for the VST and audio data. I know that based on the performance, Black series is the best option. But consider the price and the noise (I love the green's silent performance), I think I'll go with WD green again, but still waiting and searching for another option. Will decide tomorrow.

Maybe its kinda OOT, so sorry for the mods.

twinklestar said:

Hi Jumanji, thank you very much for the reply.

Yeah, this morning when I turn on my PC, the drive cannot be detected by BIOS. It keeps clicking and when I proceed to windows it stuck on "Starting Windows". I'll take it to the recovery service and see if they could save my data.

Umm, about the truly professional thing, is there any clue to know if the recovery service is a truly professional or not? Last time I went to a recovery service (my Seagate Backup Plus 3TB failed around 8 months ago - PCB burned), they don't have the PCB and asked me to find an identical HDD for PCB swap (just like your suggestion). However, I couldn't find it and at the end I gave up on that drive.

Also, I planned to buy a new internal SATA drive around 3 - 4TB. Is there any suggestion for the brand/type? Since I had 2 failed Seagate drives right now, I think I'll go with WDC. Please advise.

Thank you very much.

No professional recovery company would ask a client to find a compatible drive. This is more difficult than might be apparent. Even 2 drives with identical model numbers may have been manufactured in different countries and have significant internal differences. Specific numbers need to match and this information is difficult to obtain. Replacing the PC board typically requires the transfer of drive specific information from the original. While not particularly difficult for a professional data recovery company (certainly easier than some other recovery methods) it would be a challenge for even a well informed amateur.

The best way to maintain data integrity is to have backups of your data. All files of any importance should have at least one backup copy, 2 or more backup copies if the files are of particular importance. Even professional data recovery cannot be relied on.

As Miller stated it is a formidable task to locate an identical in all respects PCB for the HDD with the same Part number,Revision number etc.. That is why I added the word "truly" to prefix the Professional Data Service. (If you had purchased two identical drives at the same time from the same vendor, there are greater chances that both PCBs are from the same batch and identical in all respects.)

Seagate themselves have data recovery partners who may be well versed and well equipped to deal with Seagate HDDs. In-lab recovery: Reliable and affordable data recovery services when you need it | Seagate

As far as buying external HDD is concerned, if you are inclined towards Western Digital external drives, make sure that you buy only their "Elements" models ( both in Desktop and portable HDDs). Any other model like My Book, Passport, Passport Ultra etc., incorporate Hardware Encryption that has the potential of locking you out of any DIY data recovery that may otherwise be possible with other non-hardware encrypted drives.