Partition table have disappear (WD Caviar Green)

How to use TestDisk to recover lost partition
Forum rules
When asking for technical support:
- Search for posts on the same topic before posting a new question.
- Give clear, specific information in the title of your post.
- Include as many details as you can, MOST POSTS WILL GET ONLY ONE OR TWO ANSWERS.
- Post a follow up with a "Thank you" or "This worked!"
- When you learn something, use that knowledge to HELP ANOTHER USER LATER.
Before posting, please read https://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk.pdf
Locked
Message
Author
Porkepix
Posts: 4
Joined: 11 Jun 2012, 21:27

Partition table have disappear (WD Caviar Green)

#1 Post by Porkepix »

Hello,

I create that topic in the case someone have a solution to my (big) problem.

I bought two years ago an external hard disk Western Digital MyBook Essential (1,5TB).

A few months ago, the case drop me : the usb port come unsoldered of the electronic circuit, and sold it a new time does nothing.

So I bought a new case and put my HDD into it, no problem to assemble it (Caviar Green HDD for information).

But I was badly surprised after assemble it when I wanted to use it : The disk was not recognized and was seen as a RAW disk with no partitions, like an unformated disk.

I tried all testdisk's tests (no resultats), gparted's search of partition, photorec (it found 3 big swf diles (3GB) that I never had) and a lot of other tools, no one give results (I had Linux, Windows and Mac OS available).

To be brief, I'm in a deadlock. I really want to find a solution to recover my data and recreate my partition table if possible. (I think I saw while searching on Google for solution that these Caviar Green from WD have informations like sectors size which are not the habitual one, but no more informations).

If someone have a solution, I tried lot of things for a few months ago and it gives nothing...

Thanks in advance.

PS : If someone prefer to reply in french, which is my first language, see here.

User avatar
Fiona
Posts: 2835
Joined: 18 Feb 2012, 17:19
Location: Ludwigsburg/Stuttgart - Germany

Re: Partition table have disappear (WD Caviar Green)

#2 Post by Fiona »

WD disks are often hardware encrypted.
Not even the user did notice it.
Some information about it;
http://forum.cgsecurity.org/phpBB3/repa ... ypted#p814
The first thing to do might be to exclude that your disk was encrypted.

best regards

Fiona

Porkepix
Posts: 4
Joined: 11 Jun 2012, 21:27

Re: Partition table have disappear (WD Caviar Green)

#3 Post by Porkepix »

Fiona wrote:WD disks often hardware encrypted.
Not even the user did notice it.
Some information about it;
http://forum.cgsecurity.org/phpBB3/repa ... ypted#p814
The first thing to do might be to exclude that your disk was encrypted.

best regards

Fiona

With your description and your link, I guess it's the problem I have.

But....I can't use original enclosure : as I said, electronic circuit have usb port unsoldered. I tried to solder it a new time and it had not work. I could look a new time, but I hope nothing from this side.

Is another solution possible ? :/

Porkepix.

Locked