External Hard Drive problem during format/isnt recognized any more

[slipcubusknight]

I have a western digital external hard drive and i was attempting to reformat to NTSF to enable use for my mac and pc. someone unplugged the laptop charger and it died about 1/4 of the way through the format. Now when i plug it in it won't show up on the mac or pc. is there any way i could fix this or does it need to be repaired?

 

[BadBigBen]

if you take out the drive and hook it up to a PC internally, and it gets recognized in the BIOS, then there is a chance that you could just nuke (zero) the drive and reformat it...

DBAN or ActiveKilldisk, both great apps for doing just that, the first is a live CD (or floppy) and it is free, where as the second is a commercial app which runs under windows...



Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[G0AOZ]

If it's under warranty, then send it back for replacement.

Otherwise, a few points to check...

1. Does the unit have its own PSU? Confirm if it's working.
2. When powered, is the external unit recognised when it's plugged into a USB port?
3. Open the casing of the unit and extract the drive. Connect the drive directly to another computer - try just the power connector first - does it spin up?
4. If drive spins ok, connect relevant interface (IDE, SATA), and then check in the BIOS to see if it's recognised, and then let Windows Disk Management partition and format it for you.

ROGER - G0AOZ.

 

[vacunita]

Even though it ma not be seen from Windows Explorer or Mac's Finder perhaps Windows can see it from Disk Management.

Right Click on My Computer (Or just "Computer" depending on the version of Windows it is) Select Manage, and Go down to Storage-> Disk Management. It should if its working show up there and let you complete the formatting procedure.


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Phil AKA Vacunita
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Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.