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  • April 3, 2012 at 11:43 pm #2137861

    What may be the issue with external hard drive on USB?

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    by sayef · about 12 years ago

    I have a 160GB Western Digital USB external hard drive. Some times it ‘behaves’ quite normally, but at most of the times, it disconnects itself from the port very frequently, and many times it also gives the message for formatting the drive! Sometimes, the computer also fails to recognize the existence of the drive. After taking out and putting in the USB cable 2/3 times, the drive becomes active. And once active, 99% percent of time the working becomes quite smooth.

    What is the problem, and how can this be overcomed? Is there any USB version problem? Is there any chance of physically damaging the drive, and thus loosing my important data? Please answer at the earliest.

    – Sayef Hussain (sayefhussain@yahoo.com)

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    • April 3, 2012 at 11:43 pm #2885635

      Clarifications

      by sayef · about 12 years ago

      In reply to What may be the issue with external hard drive on USB?

      Clarifications

    • April 4, 2012 at 5:29 am #2885627

      Yes, there is a VERY good chance of data loss

      by cmiller5400 · about 12 years ago

      In reply to What may be the issue with external hard drive on USB?

      Yes, there is a VERY good chance of data loss, in fact, I’d place money on it failing. Back up that drive posthaste!!!

      Sounds like something is failing in the circuitry of the drive or the USB case electronics. If under warranty, send it back for repair (wipe it first with a tool like DBAN)

    • April 4, 2012 at 12:59 pm #2885607

      take a look at the power supply

      by databaseben · about 12 years ago

      In reply to What may be the issue with external hard drive on USB?

      be sure that the drive has an external power supply. although, power is provided through the usb ports, sometimes it is not a reliable source to energize power hungry devices.

      in any case, what i’m trying to explain is that if the external drive looses power, then it can be seen by the o.s. as disable, dysfunctional or not connected.

      incidentally, you didnt’ mention what o.s. your using. however, microsoft came out with a patch for xp that addresses the instability in usb power supply.

    • April 4, 2012 at 3:09 pm #2885606

      take backup and check with provider

      by jayaprasanth · about 12 years ago

      In reply to What may be the issue with external hard drive on USB?

      take immediate backup your data and such issues might be with virus, drive, power lose connection or hardware issues, make sure one by one..

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