external hard drive problems

[Paul_wyatt]

I have an external hard drive that has suddenly become unaccesable in "My Computer" when I click on the drive I either get a message that the drive needs to be formatted or that the parameters are incorrect - the 1tb drive is over half full with photos and videos.

The drive itself appears to spin ok and when I run the "chkdsk" prompt through cmd all the drive details show including the number of files and folders and says that there is no error. I just cannot seem to be able to access the files.

Please help as the contents of the drive are of great sentimental importance.

[Ray1000]

Hi Paul,

 

Have you tried the external HD on another computer?

 

Ray

[KenB]

Hi Paul and welcome to ExTS

 

Try Ray's suggestion .............try the drive on another system / other USB port.

 

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Under no circumstances should you Format this drive - you will lose everything ( I assume that you are aware of this but it had to be said :) )

 

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when I run the "chkdsk" prompt through cmd

I don't understand this bit.

You say the drive doesn't show in "My Computer" but you ran a CHKDSK on it from a Command Prompt.

You would need a drive letter to do this.

Can you see the drive in "My Computer" as a drive letter ?