Dead external HDD?

[sunfast]

I've got an external HDD I used when I was windows only. One day it went a bit funny - gave me an error saying the device couldn't start. So I put it in a cupboard and forgot it.

Now I'm a Mac person I thought maybe I could kick start it again. Plugging it into my Mac (via USB and FireWire) gets no response at all. Is it definitely dead? Or anything I can try to resurrect it?

 

[livingfortoday]

I've got an external HDD I used when I was windows only. One day it went a bit funny - gave me an error saying the device couldn't start. So I put it in a cupboard and forgot it.

Now I'm a Mac person I thought maybe I could kick start it again. Plugging it into my Mac (via USB and FireWire) gets no response at all. Is it definitely dead? Or anything I can try to resurrect it?

You might want to Google "hard drive freezer" and see about that. Apparently you can sometimes put dead hard drives in the freezer and when they thaw out they'll work again. I have never tried this before, though.

 

[mrichmon]

Now I'm a Mac person I thought maybe I could kick start it again. Plugging it into my Mac (via USB and FireWire) gets no response at all. Is it definitely dead? Or anything I can try to resurrect it?

You can always buy a replacement hard drive to put into the external enclosure. Assuming that it is the drive that failed and not the bridge board.

Plug the drive into your Mac using a firewire cable. Turn on the drive. Select "About this Mac" from the apple menu. Click on "More Info..." then click on "Firewire" is the enclosure listed as a device? If it is listed then the drive is dead and can simply be replaced while still using the enclosure.

 

[sunfast]

You can always buy a replacement hard drive to put into the external enclosure. Assuming that it is the drive that failed and not the bridge board.

Plug the drive into your Mac using a firewire cable. Turn on the drive. Select "About this Mac" from the apple menu. Click on "More Info..." then click on "Firewire" is the enclosure listed as a device? If it is listed then the drive is dead and can simply be replaced while still using the enclosure.

It's listed there as "Unknown Device". Does that mean it's dead?

 

[livingfortoday]

It's listed there as "Unknown Device". Does that mean it's dead?

It might just need to be reformatted. Open up Disk Utility and see if you can see it and reformat it from there.

 

[sunfast]

It might just need to be reformatted. Open up Disk Utility and see if you can see it and reformat it from there.

It doesn't appear sadly . I've connected it to my PC where it appears but says it "can't start". I don't really care about the data on it but it would be nice to expand my storage space.