Example Manufacturers:
- LaCie (eg. Big Disk, Bigger Disk, Bigger Disk Extreme, Quadra
etc)
- Iomega
- Freecom
- Maxtor (eg. OneTouch)
- Western Digital
(eg. Passport, MyBook)
- Toshiba
- Seagate (eg. FreeAgent, Expansion)
- All types of 'Rugged' external hard drive
Data
Clinic are able to recover data from any type
of external hard disk.
Problems: External USB and Firewire hard
disks basically consist of a case containing a standard IDE
or SATA hard disk with a USB or Firewire interface adaptor.
Thus, these units are prone to all the usual
problems relating to IDE & SATA hard drives
plus some others that the external case and interface may bring.
Two of the most common additional problems we have noticed with
these drives are:
- They get knocked over, dropped, banged etc. In almost all
cases, the resulting impact they suffer will cause problems.
- They have a tendancy to overheat. This is due to inadequate
ventilation on the external case. Some external hard drives
don't contain any ventilation at all, a small number of devices
may contain a fan inside the actual case to combat temperature
build up.
Symptoms:
- If the hard drive has been dropped:
The drive will probably make a ticking / musical noise when
powered on. This is usually indicative of damage to the read
/ write heads &/or the motor. Recovery of data is often
possible - click here to read more about recovering
data from clicking / ticking hard disk drives
- If Knocked: The drive will make a buzzing
noise - usually indicative of a seized spindle. Data is nearly
always recoverable - click here to read more about data
recovery from hard drives with seized spindles
- If Overheating: The drive will suddenly
die and not be recognised by the BIOS, or the computer will
appear to start running slowly and noises from the external
hard disk may be heard.
Recovery possibilities: Entirely dependent
on the nature of the problem. Heat associated problems are often
easier to tackle than impact damage problems.
Do Not: Under no circumstances should you
continue to use the device as you may cause further damage to
the unit. Also, you should not allow the system to run
a repair utility on the drive (such as Scandisk / Chkdsk / Norton
etc) - this can often render recoverable data unrecoverable.
Read our pages specific to
Read our page specific to failure
and data recovery from Iomega Zip and Jaz disks and devices
Related symptom: Click here if
your hard
disk drive is making a beeping or bleeping sound
What if I have one of these drives but the
symptoms are different?: This is quite possible. These drives
are still prone to all the other problems hard disks suffer
from ie. mechnical failure, logical failure, bad sectors etc.
What should I do?: Call the Data Clinic
and talk your problem through with us on 0871 977 2525,
or fill
out our auto-form and we'll call you back
Links:
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A 500Gb Seagate FreeAgent drive

A Western Digital MyBook external
disk

An external LaCie USB hard disk

An external Iomega Firewire hard
disk
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