If it is not being seen in disk management then it is likely a communication problem with the USB enclosure (box holding the hard drive) and the computer.

The other option is to run data recovery software on it and you should be able to tree the hard drive, move the files off, repartition/reformat, and move the data back. If it is then it is likely that the drives problem is a MBR (master boot record/partition record) problem that can easily be fixed with something like a remote recovery. You would need to go to disk management and then see if it is reporting as a mass storage device in the machine.

So this gets a little tricky because just because “My Computer” isn’t seeing the drive it does not mean the computer is not seeing the drive. I’ve tried it on a different computer and had the same result It says “you may safely remove hardware” in the task bar My USB drives all work and I have other hard drives on the computer I follow the wizard steps and it says “successfully installed” but I cannot find my hard drive. When I plug it in to either the USB or FireWire ports the computer detects and the instillation wizard pops up. I have a 1TB Western Digital My book Hard drive. As always please leave a comment if you have a question or contact me directly at 72 ext 236. I have given what I think is the best solution to these problems. Below are some more fun Q&A about hard drive recovery.

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