• Welcome to Overclockers Forums! Join us to reply in threads, receive reduced ads, and to customize your site experience!

Please help to fix Western Digital external Hard drive problem !

Overclockers is supported by our readers. When you click a link to make a purchase, we may earn a commission. Learn More.
Status
Not open for further replies.

OC101

Member
Joined
Oct 30, 2007
I bought this 1TB WD My Passport USB hard drive not so long ago. After only a month of use on my laptop(Dell Vostro 1500 with Win7 Home 64-bit), it suddenly stopped showing up in My Computer.


When it used to work, sometimes when I plugged it into one of the four USB ports, it would beep for a very long time(not always), when it stopped beeping, it would show up in My Computer and become available for use.

But now, when the beep stops, it will not show up in My Computer at all, so I have no way to access it.
It is still there in Device Manager as
"WD My Passport 0740 USB Device" under Disk Drives
devicemanagerl.jpg



and it also show up under Disk Management...but as
Disk 1
Unknown
Not Initialized
with no report on the disk size
I am unable to initialize it. It would give me "The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error".
computermanagement.jpg


It also show up normally under Devices and Printers
devicesandprinters.jpg



At the right bottom corner of my desktop, I am able to eject the hard drive normally
ejectv.jpg



But no matter how many times, and which of the 4 USB ports I plug it in, it will just beep for a minute or so then it will still not showing up for use under My Computer.


I wasn't sure if it is simply a software problem(settings conflict, or a virus), or if the hard drive is a bad one that is dying. Because I am out of the country for the moment, I am away from my other computers.


I was able to find 3 different computers from other people to try it on. It worked on 2 out of the 3 first. One was a laptop, one was a desktop. Not only it showed up under My Computer quickly without even a single beep, but also I was able to access files on it like normal, even played a video from it.

Then the same day I went home and tried it on my laptop again after I removed my cellphone from "Devices and Printers". (my cellphone wasn't connected at the time anyway, but it was still showing up there). The hard drive actually did not beep this time after I plugged it in, and it showed up as "initialized" under Disk Manager with its size showing.
After I assigned a different letter to it, it showed up immediately in My Computer, and I was able to access everything on it.(the reason I assigned a different letter for it was because once I plugged in a flash drive without the WD hard drive plugged in, so the flash drive took the drive letter of the hard drive. Now I assigned the letter Z to the hard drive)

I was downloading a torrent to it.
Then the very next day, it stopped showing up again with the torrent no where near finishing...just started.

Now everything had returned to how it was as shown in the above pictures. Long beeping, show up everywhere except in My Computer.

There was also suggestion of not enough power from the USB ports. But I don't see it as a reason because it actually worked for a month.
I just tested it on another person's laptop, it showed the same symptom as on mine... long beeping with no showing in My Computer.

I don't get it, but I still don't think it is any hardware problem.

Someone please help me to make it to work again? :confused:
 
but I still don't think it is any hardware problem.

Someone please help me to make it to work again?

I think those two statements are really exclusive of each other. You don't think it is hardware (the drive) and there must be thousands of posts on the internet of people with those drives just quitting finally. If it is new enough to still be in warranty, I would be contacting WD and doing as they request on the way to a replacement.

1. The drives run too hot without a fan. Seagates External Usb and WD all have that problem. You probably leave yours plugged in all or most of the time and I only plug my 1.5 year old Seagate in when I am going to use it. I know about the heat problems.

2. There are problems with some laptops not supplying enough Usb power when a lot of things are plugged into Usb, but I really don't believe that is your problem. If that were so a powered Usb hub between the drive and your laptop should diagnose that problem.
 
Have you tried another (preferably shorter) USB cable? For a test, don't plug it into any "extended" plugs (such as the ones found on the front of a case), just use ones directly attached to the motherboard. I had an external drive that would almost always have I/O errors when using a longer USB cable and/or if I used the front USB ports.

If that still gives you issues, the control board in the external casing is having problems or the drive is dying. Likely the former.
 
What "thideras" said. There were even some of those drives shipped originally with a cable that was too long for some uses. Worth a try if you could find a short one less than 24 inches long. Some bought 18 inch Usb cable and got some relief.
 
The cable comes with the drive is less than a foot long. I Considered it's too short.

The cable is a very weird type on the side of the hard drive, and I don't have another cable to test.

I did test it on 3 other people's computers as I mentioned in my first post. It worked just fine on two of them, while having the same problem one the third. This fact alone lead me to believe there is no hardware problem, plus I've mentioned somehow I got it to work again on my laptop for a day before it disappeared from My Computer again. It also didn't just quit working again with no reason. Because I was silly enough to make both the USB hard drive and the internal SSD as the "Primary Partition", the laptop would not get into Windows after a reboot. I had to use system restore to make it boot into Windows. After the successful reboot, the WD hard drive no longer show up again.

I have tried it on all 4 available USB ports with no luck, and I've tried it with no other USB device attached.
 
Last edited:
For one I don't think its heat related, unless something is truly bad with the drive. I got 2x WD's drives myself.

250Gig USB 2.0 & 750Gig USB 3.0

If anything the older 250Gig is warmer and the newer one is considerably cooler after copying large amounts of data to it.

As for not enough power... only time that I've seen with these types of drives not working is in a Mac since they follow closely to the USB spec and only supply the 500mA to the USB 2.0 ports (unless things have changed) where most of the drives required just a little bit more power to push a startup.

Have you tried it in a few different PC's to see if its maybe computer related? Also try both USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 ports to see if that might solve the issue. Its possible it might be a bad connector? Course they had to make a special connector on it so its a PITA that you'd probably need to get a replacement to see if its a bad cable instead of using something around the house.
 
For one I don't think its heat related, unless something is truly bad with the drive. I got 2x WD's drives myself.

250Gig USB 2.0 & 750Gig USB 3.0

If anything the older 250Gig is warmer and the newer one is considerably cooler after copying large amounts of data to it.

As for not enough power... only time that I've seen with these types of drives not working is in a Mac since they follow closely to the USB spec and only supply the 500mA to the USB 2.0 ports (unless things have changed) where most of the drives required just a little bit more power to push a startup.

Have you tried it in a few different PC's to see if its maybe computer related? Also try both USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 ports to see if that might solve the issue. Its possible it might be a bad connector? Course they had to make a special connector on it so its a PITA that you'd probably need to get a replacement to see if its a bad cable instead of using something around the house.

OP has said >>> I did test it on 3 other people's computers as I mentioned in my first post. It worked just fine on two of them,
 
Okay, took another look around and again spent time re-reading and looking at all the screen captures.

I see one thing that maybe key.
OC101 said:
It also didn't just quit working again with no reason. Because I was silly enough to make both the USB hard drive and the internal SSD as the "Primary Partition"
IF you left the WD My Passport 0740 Usb device in that condition and only made the computer reboot by running system restore, then that can be your problem with not being recognized by your computer any longer.

- mass storage device (I presume this is the USB2 driver)
- My Passport 0740 USB device
- WD SES USB device

According to WD website, those are three drivers that can be installed with the WD My Passport 0740 Usb device when the drive is initially installed to the computer it is to be used with. If either of those drivers was installed and now corrupt, there can be a problem with the O/S seeing the drive and being usable.

Further, when one user of that exact same drive came to your issue this is what transpired >> WD My Passport 0740 Usb device >> USB3 drive not present after PC boot >> Problem solved :) (USB3 drive now automatically appears in Explorer when I boot the computer)

The WD guy told me to format it. I wasn't inclined to believe him because the drive worked in every way apart from the boot problem.

I formatted it as per my normal practice, and it worked.

So there are literally many issues reported with that drive >> WD My Passport 0740 Usb device << and the WD website has many FAQ's about problems. I was amazed at how many 'triangles with an exclamation point" were at WD stie. Triangles warning, danger Will Robinson.

1. You could have a WD driver for that drive on "your" computer that is corrupt. Those drivers on another computer are in general not there so you get the drive seen and apparently useable.

2. Dorking with the partition on the WD drive dorked it for working on your computer that has WD software driver installed.

3. REmoving every trace of WD driver software and references to such software from the Registry even, might fix the problem at your computer. They may still need to REinstalled but in a non-corrupt environment.

4. You could take that drive to another computer and format it as one Extended/Logical partition and bring it back to your computer and it 'most' likely would work with the '3' WD drivers removed. I say with the WD drivers completely removed since there is no assurance they are not corrupted.

5. You can go to the forum for your type of Laptop and post an issue with WD My Passport 0740 Usb device >> USB3 drive not present after PC boot and I am willing to bet someone in the forum for your laptop type has seen the problem.

6. You can go to the WD forum and post WD My Passport 0740 Usb device >> USB3 drive not present after PC boot >> my brand/type laptop and you will see more with the problem.

I say #5 and #6 above since g00gle by that drive model, finds plenty of g00gle hits.

Messing with a partition can cause many problems. My brother has been talking with me for nearly two weeks now since he used Samsung proprietary software on his drive to set the partition alignment. Just like your drive works in one computer and not another, his partitions are seen by some software and not others. Depends on how the software looks at partitions. Depends on other computers and their drivers as in your situation.

In the end, I have finally gotten my own head around your type of problem if I see it again. You may not yet have come to that point. You will have to do so though sooner or later.

1. I know in general that WD and Seagate external drives have heat issues since they have no fans. I react accordingly. YMMV.

2. I format my external Usb drives to Extended/Logical partitions for easier recognition in most computers.

3. That about covers it now that I have done my stint in the WD FAQ's and Driver fit no fit section at WD along with g00gle search for your particular drive and not recognized at boot-up.
 
I bought this 1TB WD My Passport USB hard drive not so long ago. After only a month of use on my laptop(Dell Vostro 1500 with Win7 Home 64-bit), it suddenly stopped showing up in My Computer.


When it used to work, sometimes when I plugged it into one of the four USB ports, it would beep for a very long time(not always), when it stopped beeping, it would show up in My Computer and become available for use.

But now, when the beep stops, it will not show up in My Computer at all, so I have no way to access it.
It is still there in Device Manager as
"WD My Passport 0740 USB Device" under Disk Drives
devicemanagerl.jpg



and it also show up under Disk Management...but as
Disk 1
Unknown
Not Initialized
with no report on the disk size
I am unable to initialize it. It would give me "The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error".
computermanagement.jpg


It also show up normally under Devices and Printers
devicesandprinters.jpg



At the right bottom corner of my desktop, I am able to eject the hard drive normally
ejectv.jpg



But no matter how many times, and which of the 4 USB ports I plug it in, it will just beep for a minute or so then it will still not showing up for use under My Computer.


I wasn't sure if it is simply a software problem(settings conflict, or a virus), or if the hard drive is a bad one that is dying. Because I am out of the country for the moment, I am away from my other computers.


I was able to find 3 different computers from other people to try it on. It worked on 2 out of the 3 first. One was a laptop, one was a desktop. Not only it showed up under My Computer quickly without even a single beep, but also I was able to access files on it like normal, even played a video from it.

Then the same day I went home and tried it on my laptop again after I removed my cellphone from "Devices and Printers". (my cellphone wasn't connected at the time anyway, but it was still showing up there). The hard drive actually did not beep this time after I plugged it in, and it showed up as "initialized" under Disk Manager with its size showing.
After I assigned a different letter to it, it showed up immediately in My Computer, and I was able to access everything on it.(the reason I assigned a different letter for it was because once I plugged in a flash drive without the WD hard drive plugged in, so the flash drive took the drive letter of the hard drive. Now I assigned the letter Z to the hard drive)

I was downloading a torrent to it.
Then the very next day, it stopped showing up again with the torrent no where near finishing...just started.

Now everything had returned to how it was as shown in the above pictures. Long beeping, show up everywhere except in My Computer.

There was also suggestion of not enough power from the USB ports. But I don't see it as a reason because it actually worked for a month.
I just tested it on another person's laptop, it showed the same symptom as on mine... long beeping with no showing in My Computer.

I don't get it, but I still don't think it is any hardware problem.

Someone please help me to make it to work again? :confused:
 
I have the same problem :-(
someone got any solution ???
please help for a suggetions
 
Wd my Passport Hard drive


I have exactly same problem,

please help.

i cannot afford to loose my data in there.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back