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Trying to use former WD1200BEVS 2.5 Dell Inspiron 6400 Drive as a USB Enclosure Spare.
I have used the Western Digital Dos Drive Diagnostics and written zeros to the complete WD1200BEVS 2.5" notebook drive (took about an hour. I have been able to format the drive in Windows 7 but, on rebooting and looking for it, I cannot see it in the USB Enclosure. The hard drive is not password protected.
I'm still hopeful on using this drive as a spare backup drive but am not sure what to try next.
Pete.
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Reply from Ncix Support; Hi Pete, Can you see if KillDisk is able to delete this partition? As for taking the drive in to be looked at, honestly the service fee would probably be more than the price of a new drive. Sincerely, NCIX.com
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Dated May 25, 2011 at 11:22 PM reply from you Did the WD1200BEVS come with the Dell computer? Yes, it was the only drive in the laptop prior to replacing it with your larger 500GB drive. If so, there may be a hidden partition that may account for the issues that you are experiencing. You might want to use a utility like GParted to see if you can remove any hidden partitions or MHDD to run a low-level format. I have tried a low level format and a "zero write" and have managed to get rid of all of the data on the disk. However, there is a small unallocated partition on the drive which I cannot delete, access or alter. I'm stuck... If I brought the drive in would you be willing to have a look at it? Pete.
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I have a four year old Dell Inspiron 6400 with the above drive getting full. I purchased your 500GB 7200 Notebook Drive and used the WD Acronis Utility from your site to move the old drive partition to the new drive. All went well and the new drive is working fine. Now, I wish to use the old drive (the WD1200BEVS Via USB Enclosure) as a backup drive. Using the Acronis utility again, I try to write zeros to the drive and reformat it. This does not work. In Windows 7, I can see the WD1200 as an unallocated drive (black bar) but cannot do anything to it or with it. It seems the drive is write protected or something like that. How can I access the old drive and use it as a spare? Thanks for your help... Peter Butschek.
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ejn63
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June 5th, 2011 09:00
Make sure the external enclosure has a dual USB port cable (you must use BOTH ports at the notebook end). If it doesn't, you'll need a powered hub. Chances are that if you're using just one USB port, the power to the drive is not sufficient to operate it.
Enceladus
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June 5th, 2011 16:00
If your Western Digital requires power from two ports to operate then either your USB enclosure is toast/not working properly or more likely the hard drive is about to fail.
FYI there are also USB enclosures available with a dedicated 5 volt power brick.
Laptop hard drives drawing excessive current is a standard mode of failure IMHO. If I am right you were lucky to get your data transferred before it gives up the ghost. Don't rely on the drive!
Daddiekat
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June 5th, 2011 17:00
Thanks so much for the ideas and suggestions. I have redone the DOS Imaging procedure and the drive is now working well on a single USB cable. Thanks again... :-)