Recovered 2TB of data from a broken HDD

[Haloman800]

I have a 2TB Western Digital external hard drive I got back in 2011, the mini-USB connector broke back in December, so I took it out of its shell and plugged it in via SATA II on my computer.. It showed up in Windows as Unallocated...

..After several hours of trying to recover and digging I eventually found out that Western Digital has "Hardware Encryption" on their external drives, what that means is, if the circuit board or connector breaks, you lose access to the data with no way to recover it unless you buy the exact same drive and salvage it.

I called Western Digital and they wanted $800 to ATTEMPT to recover the data, heck no.

I searched and found the PCB on eBay from a guy in China for around $23, after nearly a month and a half it finally arrived, I hooked it up to my drive and it works!

This is also a reminder to make a backup of your data! I am doing so now. I would also NOT recommend Western Digital drives, they basically hold your data captive and you must pay extremely high amounts of money to recover it. At least the external ones.

 

[Joe88]

they basically hold your data captive and you must pay extremely high amounts of money to recover it

welcome to the wonderful world of data recovery

all companies do this

 

[Haloman800]

welcome to the wonderful world of data recovery

all companies do this

I understand Data Recovery companies do this, but Western Digital, the maker of the drives do this to you.. You're basically paying for them to own your data.

There is absolutely ZERO benefit of their "Hardware Encryption" they tout as a feature, since you cannot set any password and you cannot turn it off. If you call support and mention a bad drive, within three seconds they'll start telling you about their "Data Recovery partners" that charge nearly 1 Grand, like I've mentioned.

 

[PolloDiablo]

Same here, I have a WD Essential too...
Tried to hook the drive to my pc and showed as unallocated. If you want to use it as an internal HDD you should format it.

 

[Haloman800]

Same here, I have a WD Essential too...
Tried to hook the drive to my pc and showed as unallocated. If you want to use it as an internal HDD you should format it.

If you still have data on it, either hook it back up with the external adapter (if it still works), or search the serial number on it and buy a replacement.

 

[PolloDiablo]

If you still have data on it, either hook it back up with the external adapter (if it still works), or search the serial number on it and buy a replacement.

mine still works
I just like to tear things apart for the sake of knowledge

also... I found that the external adapter works with other hardrives
Now I have a Seagate Barracuda My Book Essential 500 GB

 

[Gahars]

Huh. You'd think someone named "Haloman" would be used to corrupted computers.

 

[Haloman800]

Huh. You'd think someone named "Haloman" would be used to corrupted computers.

It would be a corrupted hard drive, not a computer, and it's not even that. I don't get the joke either.

 

[Haloman800]

mine still works
I just like to tear things apart for the sake of knowledge

also... I found that the external adapter works with other hardrives
Now I have a Seagate Barracuda My Book Essential 500 GB

Lol nice. I'm sure other adapters would work, but in the case of Western Digital, if you swap out drive adapters, you'll lose any data you have on the device.

 

[Sterling]

It would be a corrupted hard drive, not a computer, and it's not even that. I don't get the joke either.

It's a shot at Cortana.

/Gahars

 

[kupo3000]

You're lucky it wasn't the actual PCB logic board from the hardrive itself.
Right now I've got a 2 TB hard drive with a burned out PCB logic board.
To replace that it has to be the same model, serial and firmware.

 

[Chary]

Sounds like it was a lot of trouble. Glad you got your data back.

 

[jalaneme]

well they have to make money somehow, it just shows that money talks but we end up being the ones who get the short end of the stick when it comes to data recovery.

 

[Chary]

To the local consumer, $800 is an exorbitant price for data recovery, but think about it: large corporations don't have time to waste on data recovery. If a big company tanks a hard drive, $800 isn't that much to pay, considering what important data they keep on it. I don't think WD expects non-corporations to use the service. But, I will admit, they need an alternative to recovering data. Not everyone is smart enough to repair a HDD, and I'm sure plenty of people have lost their files, due to them not having a ridiculous $800 to pay for recovery.

 

[Haloman800]

To the local consumer, $800 is an exorbitant price for data recovery, but think about it: large corporations don't have time to waste on data recovery. If a big company tanks a hard drive, $800 isn't that much to pay, considering what important data they keep on it. I don't think WD expects non-corporations to use the service. But, I will admit, they need an alternative to recovering data. Not everyone is smart enough to repair a HDD, and I'm sure plenty of people have lost their files, due to them not having a ridiculous $800 to pay for recovery.

That makes sense, and I agree about there needing to be an alternate method other than a regular consumer forking over $800. Especially when a lot of times it's just the circuit board (as in my case), and it wouldn't even be a problem if there was no hardware encryption (which has no benefit whatsoever).