iFixit - Answers With Device "Western Digital Elements HD"

Western Digital Elements HD: WD External Hard drive isn't accesible

Wed, 15 Sep 2021 15:50:58 -0700

Help would be greatly appreciated! I have a 1tb Western Digital Elements External Hard Drive that is <1 year old, and up until two days ago, was working fine.

There was no physical damage it received. I had the drive plugged into my laptop, I attempted to open a folder on it after some time had passed: it froze, then closed out. I unplugged the drive and re-inserted it: my computer recognizes that something was plugged in, but I cannot access the files on the drive.

There is no clicking noise. It lights up fine, and I can hear the disk spinning smoothly. It shows up under Device Manager under its proper name, but not in Disk Management. When I open disk management, I get a message that says “you must initialize a disk before logical disk manager can access it”. It does not work when plugged into different computers, nor when switching the cables.

I am a computer novice, but my sleuthing leads me to believe that the issue is with the SATA connections. Though this seems to be an easy fix, Western Digital unfortunately has the sata connections integrated into the rest of the board. A video had suggested buying another identical hard drive and replacing the controller board with the old one, but others have said that is a bad idea. Please help me.

⟐ Answer edited September 15, 2021 at 15:50 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: Western Digital Elements HD Make a sound like Tik Tik Tik

Sat, 17 Dec 2022 11:36:17 -0700

My Western Digital Elements HD Make a Sound as Tik Tik TiK after connected to laptop and Not recognized

please your help

⟐ Commented December 17, 2022 at 11:36 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: After "copy" "paste" the hardrive does not working anymore

Mon, 05 Jul 2021 14:47:07 -0700

I just bought a hardrive. I plugged it, copy paste some file. The transfer didn’t finish. It gives an error and now it does not work at all. (see an example)

Notice : I’ve already done some scan and try to find the hardrive through the windows built-in options or with another program called “AOMEI Partition Assistant” but it does not appear.

I also used wd elements scan program. It cannot do anything because of there are too much blocks error.

⟐ Answer accepted July 05, 2021 at 14:47 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: Hard Drive not showing up

Wed, 15 Sep 2021 08:14:34 -0700

My 1TB WD hard drive is taking too long to show up on my Windows 10, it's been 30mintues. Last night I was trying to move some files in order to make it work faster because some files were not opening and the window was getting shut again and again. While transferring my system hanged so I unplugged the drive without safety ejection. This happened multiple times, now my hard drive is not showing up at all.

⟐ Answered September 15, 2021 at 8:14 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: Works normally connected to USB 2.0 port, not even detected to a 3.0

Tue, 29 Jun 2021 00:41:32 -0700

This disk drive is 6 years old and has always worked in 3.0 mode but for some months I have noticed that it is not even detected when it is connected to a 3.0 (SS) type port. Instead it normally works at the speed expected for protocol 2.0, when it is at a USB 2.0 port. Why? Has something been irreparably damaged? I tried to format it but it didn't help.

⟐ Commented June 29, 2021 at 0:41 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: Cannot be recognised through my mac

Sun, 05 Jan 2020 06:02:06 -0700

i have a newly bought 2017 13.3” macbook pro and i also bought something called a satechi USB C pass through hub to connect usb-A devices to my macbook.

Originally my external hard drive would show up and i could transfer with it but suddenly it stopped showing up on my mac, i believe it’s might be due to me pulling out my hard drive without ejecting first, it works on my other laptops and another mac that i have but not on my new one, i also believe the problem might be the usb c pass through hub or my mac (which i doubt because it’s newly bought) USBs work but not hard drives!! please help.

it cannot be seen in disk utility nor terminal via diskutil list and i’ve also checked finder preferences for the checkbox for external drives. I’ve tried factory resetting and also updating MacOS. It also says it has malfunctioned and cannot be recognise when i use bootcamp

⟐ Answered January 05, 2020 at 6:02 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: External disk fatal hardware error

Sat, 23 Jan 2021 16:32:36 -0700

I am trying to get access to my external hard drive and hopefully the data on it. However, my disk is not being recognized by the computer. I have tried opening Windows disk manager and it immediately gives me the pop-up window, that I have to Initialize the disk with ( MBR or GPT tables) if I want to use the disk, but when I click ok, it gives me the error: The request failed due to a fatal device hardware error, in disk part, it is being recognized but with the size of 0 bytes. I had used TestDisk program but the disk is not being recognized.

Are there any other steps I can try for recovering data?

Should I try to tear it apart and then what to do?

⟐ Answered January 23, 2021 at 16:32 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: WD Elements HD index cannot be read. How do I restore the data on it?

Sat, 28 Nov 2020 09:00:55 -0700

My computer is unable to read the index on my WD Elements HD.

Is there any way to restore the data without taking it to an expert?

⟐ Answer accepted November 28, 2020 at 9:00 MST

Western Digital Elements HD: How to fix External hard drive gone

Tue, 10 Oct 2023 05:07:11 -0700

Hard drive is light show

Western Digital Elements HD: Are these drives shuckable?

Sun, 07 Mar 2021 13:12:17 -0700

I have one of these, but I would like to replace the case with something that plays better with the Linux kernel. Can I remove the drive and do you know what drive is inside?

⟐ Commented March 07, 2021 at 13:12 MST