3TB of Data on WD External Drive Now Reads as Unknown, Unallocated, Not Initialized! HELP!!

Using TestDisk to repair the filesystem
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OnThePike
Posts: 2
Joined: 19 Apr 2017, 16:10

3TB of Data on WD External Drive Now Reads as Unknown, Unallocated, Not Initialized! HELP!!

#1 Post by OnThePike »

Greetings all,

First, please understand I am not all that computer savvy, so please speak to me as if I were a complete dummy. Main reason is, I had a brain injury a few years ago and I don't learn things as quickly anymore, but I can understand easy instructions. So please try to keep technical stuff to a minimum and assume from the get go I have no idea what I'm doing here!!

Here are the background details:

I spilled an entire cup of coffee into my computer as well as many of my external drives. My computer aside, we are only speaking of a WESTERN DIGITAL 4TB MY BOOK EXTERNAL USB 3.0 DRIVE. This drive would no longer show in my list of drives. After cleaning and reinstalling, again not in list. So I checked the drive while plugged into a known good power source and it was not spinning nor was the indicator light on. After removing the power cord completely and using another 12v 1.5a and 12v 1a adapter, the outcome was the same.

This told me at least one problem occurred; The PCB inside the MyBook case had blown. I disassembled the case and removed the drive from the case, then removed the power and USB connection board from the drive to reveal the standard HD connections. I then connected one of my old HD SATA to USB connectors and the drive began to immediately spin. Thinking this was great news and an easy fix turned out not to be the case. After restarting my PC, the drive was still not listed.

So off to Disk Management which revealed: Disk 7 Unknown, 3725.99 GB, Not Initialized, Unallocated.

Now I'm frantic. I have over 3TB of data, the last 30 years of my life on that drive. Documents, family photos that can never be replaced, including pictures and videos of now and long deceased friends and relatives and so much more. This was my primary backup drive. I must get this data!

This drive had two partitions, I believe, because it always opened TWO DRIVE LETTERS on my PC. The first (L:) was a password partition listed as 0 bytes UDF. The second drive (M:), after entering my password, listed all my files and folders under a second drive letter listed as NTFS.

For the last 24 hours, I have been running 3 recovery tools:

Mini Tool Power Data Recovery Free (currently at 35% with 31 hours left)
Mini Tool Partition Recovery Wizard Free ( at 17%)
EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard which ran out of memory and crashed.

I am still running the other two, and started Test Disk about 30 minutes ago.

I will provide snapshots of all including the log file. Actually I have stopped TestDisk after the log file grew to 210MB!!

My computer: HP Pavilion Elite Windows Media Center PC running Windows Vista SP2 x86 32-bit model D5200 somewhat modified with 4G RAM but uses only about 2.5G. Many of the USB ports, as well as a few other things no longer work or work properly. The PC itself is unstable due to the coffee spill, but it's the very least of my concerns. I've needed a new PC for years. Now is a good time. So my ONLY CONCERN is getting the external drive working or getting the data to another drive.

This is where you kind folks come in.

Code: Select all

Wed Apr 19 11:29:33 2017
Command line: TestDisk

TestDisk 7.1-WIP, Data Recovery Utility, April 2017
Christophe GRENIER <grenier@cgsecurity.org>
http://www.cgsecurity.org
OS: Windows Vista (6002) SP2
Compiler: GCC 5.4, Cygwin32 2005.2
ext2fs lib: 1.43.1, ntfs lib: 10:0:0, reiserfs lib: none, ewf lib: 20140608, curses lib: ncurses 6.0
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(/dev/sda)=800171491328
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(/dev/sdg)=500107862016
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(/dev/sdh)=4000753476096
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\PhysicalDrive0)=800171491328
filewin32_getfilesize(\\.\PhysicalDrive1) GetFileSize err Incorrect function.

filewin32_setfilepointer(\\.\PhysicalDrive1) SetFilePointer err Incorrect function.

Warning: can't get size for \\.\PhysicalDrive1
filewin32_getfilesize(\\.\PhysicalDrive2) GetFileSize err Incorrect function.

filewin32_setfilepointer(\\.\PhysicalDrive2) SetFilePointer err Incorrect function.

Warning: can't get size for \\.\PhysicalDrive2
filewin32_getfilesize(\\.\PhysicalDrive3) GetFileSize err Incorrect function.

filewin32_setfilepointer(\\.\PhysicalDrive3) SetFilePointer err Incorrect function.

Warning: can't get size for \\.\PhysicalDrive3
filewin32_getfilesize(\\.\PhysicalDrive4) GetFileSize err Incorrect function.

filewin32_setfilepointer(\\.\PhysicalDrive4) SetFilePointer err Incorrect function.

Warning: can't get size for \\.\PhysicalDrive4
filewin32_getfilesize(\\.\PhysicalDrive5) GetFileSize err Incorrect function.

filewin32_setfilepointer(\\.\PhysicalDrive5) SetFilePointer err Incorrect function.

Warning: can't get size for \\.\PhysicalDrive5
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\PhysicalDrive6)=500107862016
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\PhysicalDrive7)=4000753476096
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\C:)=789248484864
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\D:)=10914946560
filewin32_getfilesize(\\.\E:) GetFileSize err Incorrect function.

filewin32_setfilepointer(\\.\E:) SetFilePointer err Incorrect function.

Warning: can't get size for \\.\E:
filewin32_getfilesize(\\.\F:) GetFileSize err Incorrect function.

filewin32_setfilepointer(\\.\F:) SetFilePointer err Incorrect function.

Warning: can't get size for \\.\F:
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\I:)=500096991744
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\O:)=0
Warning: can't get size for \\.\O:
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\P:)=0
Warning: can't get size for \\.\P:
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\Q:)=0
Warning: can't get size for \\.\Q:
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\R:)=0
Warning: can't get size for \\.\R:
disk_get_size_win32 IOCTL_DISK_GET_LENGTH_INFO(\\.\S:)=0
Warning: can't get size for \\.\S:
Hard disk list
Disk /dev/sda - 800 GB / 745 GiB - CHS 97281 255 63, sector size=512 - Intel Raid 0 Volume, S/N:RAID0, FW:1.0.
Disk /dev/sdg - 500 GB / 465 GiB - CHS 60801 255 63, sector size=512 - WDC WD50 00BEVT-22ZAT0
Disk /dev/sdh - 4000 GB / 3725 GiB - CHS 486397 255 63, sector size=512 - WDC WD40 EZRX-00SPEB0, S/N:600000000000, FW:80.0

Partition table type defaults to EFI GPT
Disk /dev/sdh - 4000 GB / 3725 GiB - WDC WD40 EZRX-00SPEB0
Partition table type: EFI GPT

Analyse Disk /dev/sdh - 4000 GB / 3725 GiB - CHS 486397 255 63
Trying alternate GPT
Current partition structure:
Trying alternate GPT

search_part()
Disk /dev/sdh - 4000 GB / 3725 GiB - CHS 486397 255 63
file_pread(6,1,buffer,34(0/0/35)) ReadFile Data error (cyclic redundancy check).

file_pread(6,1,buffer,35(0/0/36)) ReadFile Data error (cyclic redundancy check).

file_pread(6,14,buffer,36(0/0/37)) ReadFile Data error (cyclic redundancy check).

file_pread(6,3,buffer,50(0/0/51)) ReadFile Data error (cyclic redundancy check).

file_pread(6,3,buffer,97(0/1/35)) ReadFile Data error (cyclic redundancy check).

file_pread(6,8,buffer,113(0/1/51)) ReadFile Data error (cyclic redundancy check).
This runs along for 210,000 lines before I ended the program and snipped this truncated excerpt.
Attachments
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User avatar
cgrenier
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Posts: 5432
Joined: 18 Feb 2012, 15:08
Location: Le Perreux Sur Marne, France
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Re: 3TB of Data on WD External Drive Now Reads as Unknown, Unallocated, Not Initialized! HELP!!

#2 Post by cgrenier »

The crc (cyclic redundancy check) error means there is a physical problem. It may be a damaged head or bad sectors.
This kind of problems can only be fixed by a data recovery company.

OnThePike
Posts: 2
Joined: 19 Apr 2017, 16:10

Re: 3TB of Data on WD External Drive Now Reads as Unknown, Unallocated, Not Initialized! HELP!!

#3 Post by OnThePike »

Thanks for the depressing response. I was afraid this would be your reply. I have contacted a number of Data Recovery services and have received quotes ranging from $495 to $2,700 depending on the work needed.

I wonder if you or any of the members here can offer any suggestions for a recovery service? Any experiences would be greatly appreciated.

In the interim, here are the rest of the images I intended to post earlier as attachments in the hopes they might help someone else in the future:

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

Thanks much.
Jeff

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