External HDD visable but suddenly gone unreadable

Toruk said:

1. Not sure, must be around 2 years. Definately out of warranty. Its a desktop type, Model No. SRD00F2.
2. I thought it was just one, but disk management is showing more as you can see on the pic above.
3. I THINK it is MBR ........

Good morning @Toruk and the good news is that your Data is all safe and could be retrieved.

Partition Wizard confirms that it is an MBR drive.

The SATA to USB bridge inside your SRD00F2 - and along with it the Special Drive Translation circuitry in it that converts the 4096 ( logical Sector size) byte data stream into the normal 512 byte (physical sector size) stream - has failed. What is that? I am reproducing my post here 4TB external disk is shown as MBR formatted. How is this possible?

"The SATA to USB bridge in those advance formatted drives consists of a special Drive Translation Circuitry which takes in eight of the usual 512 byte data stream - with the clock/synchronising bits at the beginning and end - combines it and converts it into a 4096 byte stream ( shifting the clock/synchronising bits to the beginning and end of the 4096 byte) and writes into the 4096 bytes per sector. While reading the drive the same circuit breaks the data coming from the 4096 bytes in each logical sector , and presents it as a 512 bytes /sector data to the OS.,,,,,,,,,We had a few cases requiring data recovery on the HDD taken out from such cases, and we had used TestDisk to read the HDD as a 4096 byte/sector size and recover the data. ( software Drive Translation :)) One such successful recovery here after changing the sector size from 512 to 4096: Hard Drive seems corrupt. 1 Partition now showing as 3 Partitions?"

I shall continue after a short coffee break,

Note: Don't be in a hurry and don't do anything on that drive till I give the "Go" signal. Slow and steady wins the race :) .

OK,
You should now carefully pry open the case and take the HDD out without damaging it. Connect it as an internal drive on a desktop. ( You can also put it inside a new working case and plug it in externally.) - Source disk

You should also have enough space on another external drive/s to copy all data and that drive should be plugged in before running Test Disk so that TestDisk can see the disk. - Destination disk

Now follow the process starting from post #12 in this thread Hard Drive seems corrupt. 1 Partition now showing as 3 Partitions?

( In that thread, the OP had converted his drive to GPT on the wrong advice given by Team Partition Wizard and I had asked him to go back and reconvert it to MBR disk to restore it to the previous state since it was by design an MBR drive. You need not do any such thing since your drive still remains an MBR drive with the logical 4096bytes/sector size, its original state. Just start with TestDisk. You will ask TestDisk to read it as an 4096 bytes/sector disk to retrieve the data.)

( In Post #22 in that thread, the OP mfx had subsequently deleted the TestDisk Screenshot for privacy.. That TestDisk screenshot listed all his folders/files, which he then copied.)

If you have any doubts, ask for clarifications. Do not hesitate.

Go.:) ( As I said earlier, no need to hurry. Your HDD is fine and you can repeat the Test Disk run any number of times to retrieve data in phases/ to different external drives if you so choose. But excercise caution, adhere to the procedure outlined in it and do not deviate.)

Toruk said:

........Currently, the only other disk i have is a 2gb external, but im pretty sure the faulty 3gb only has less than 1gb of data, so I assume i can use the 2gb for transfering the files? If so, what do i need to format it to? Once this is confirmed, I will go ahead with the Testdisk :)
Also, once (If) the data has been recovered, will it be possible to recover the drive? (even to use internally)

Yes, you can use your existing 2TB external to copy the files to . It should already be formatted and there is no need to do anything. Just create a folder named Recovery in it and copy the files from the source disk to this Recovery folder in the Destination disk..

Extract from the other thread I referred you to:
"Please create a folder named Recovery in the new 3TB drive. ( In your case your 2TB external drive you propose to use)

Plug in your 2TB external drive and check/note its drive letter. Then run TestDisk. In TestDisk from the screen that shows all your disks confirm the drive letter of your 2TB external drive. If that drive letter is say I: then your destination to copy the files will be Directory I: \ Recovery
How to copy files listed by TestDisk:
Please read my post #28 - Copying files listed by TestDisk during Recovery here https://www.sevenforums.com/hardware...located-3.html
Note:Screenshot 5 onwards where the files are listed applies here"

And yes, once you have copied all your files and confirmed that all copied files are OK, you can wipe your 3TB drive clean, initialise it as a GPT drive, format and continue to use it as an internal drive or put it in a new external case and use it as an external drive.

All these have been mentioned in the thread by mfx I had referred you to and you will be following.