Comments on: Western Digital My Book – Opening the Case – Removing the Drive

By: BB

BB — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:32:01 +0000

this just helped me out big time. Once I opened it (which was hard as a Mo Fo) I reseated the SATA connection and everyting fired back up. Woo Hoo! That's what I call "Data Recovery Ghetto Style".

Thanks for the tutorial.

By: Carlton Bale

Carlton Bale — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 01:38:48 +0000

You have nothing to lose by remove it from the case and attaching it directly. You could try a disc recovery utility, but I wouldn't do that until you've ruled out a failure of the external enclosure.

By: Carlton Bale

Carlton Bale — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 01:37:41 +0000

The best external drive for backup is one that has 2 mirrored (i.e. RAID 1) drives inside the enclosure. So if it has two 1-terabyte drives, you only have 1 TB of storage space, but the unit keeps on working, and all data is accessible, even if one of the drives fails. For automatic in-home backup, I use a Windows Home Server. The HP servers have software that allows them to works as MAC Time Capsules (in addition to working with Windows PCs.) Also, Windows Home Server supports redundant drives. The best back solution is one that is automatic, and off-site (in case of a catastrophic event.) I recommend using Mozy.com for automatic offsite backup. Unlimited storage costs $60/year.

By: KOKO

KOKO — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 03:30:49 +0000

I bought the Thermaltake BlacX eSATA USB Docking Station. Will be here Friday. Hope to God it works! What is the best backup external hard drive out there. I'll be getting two! It has to be MAC compatible.

By: KOKO

KOKO — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:00:10 +0000

HI,
I have the 500gig mybook pro. stopped mounting on my G5 mac. I need to retrieve what was on my backup, and am nervous about taking it out of the case, and putting it in the mac internally. What would you suggest as the safest thing to try first. It's not the power, I tried both firewire & usb. It will power up, spin, it shows in disc utility, just won't mount.

By: fanuch

fanuch — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:11:26 +0000

Thanks for the instructional, i plugged in my 1Tb one morning, it made loud popping noise and the drive wouldnt work anymore, thanks to your instructions i was able to open it, and recover all 600gb of data by plugging it into a desktop pc (as the hard drive itself wasnt damaged). its still under replacement warranty so this time, i CAN have my cake, AND eat it too .

By: (Rhon)chamo

(Rhon)chamo — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 01:39:52 +0000

make sure the hooks are off the clamp.That's the whole point of using the screw drivers. Try a plastic spatula or something similar if u can.
Don't press it too hard. easy does it. els u'll end up with the hooks on the table…cheers

By: (Rhon)chamo

(Rhon)chamo — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 01:28:23 +0000

Hello George! Normally if u send your drive to the service center, its possible that some nosy person might try and recover your data using certain recovery softwares. To Prevent this, you need to clean wipe your drive first. This erases any data that remains on your sectors.
What you can do is use a software like "Kill Disk" to hard remove all the data. The name might sound crazy but i have tried and tested it and it works perfect..So, google "kill disk" and get the software. FYI, its a freeware so don't worry. Don't judge the software by its name. Its kewl….cheers
PS: Alternate softwares may be available, but ive tested this one.

By: Newear2006

Newear2006 — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 21:05:48 +0000

Thanks for this page and video. I Upgraded a working silver My Book casing from 500 Gb to 1Tb Western Digital Green Power HDD. No resets or anything required. Just a clean swap.

By: Kubilay

Kubilay — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 20:47:09 +0000

hi mate,i'm new to this stuff so appreciate your efforts.

as i was plugging my 1TB S/N : WCAU42974707, I notice acrid smell of smoke coming from it, and now i have no power at all.

1 i think i burnt the circuit board or some other problem?

2 is it possible to connect the hard disk to my desktop if i buy this USB to SATA adapter that you mention?

3 if this solution works is it easy to install it and do i need any other parts to connect it like other wires and stuff?

4 and finally would you recommend to keep the hard disk on desktop after i recover my data, would this slow down my pc because its a big hard disk?

thank you

By: Carlton Bale

Carlton Bale — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 03:38:52 +0000

You won't know for sure until you try an SATA adapter, but your drive is probably dead and would require professional data recovery to get the data off of it.

By: SEREGA

SEREGA — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 17:28:22 +0000

I NEED HELP. My WD Hard Drive yesterday stoped working and started blinking, but then it stoped blinking at all. So I thought to take it apart to get the hd out to connect to pc other way, but I dont have the adaptor yet as my pc is ide but drive is sata. So what I found out when taking apart the drive, that the control board works by itself, but when connect to it the hd it does not even light up. What could be wrong, can my drive be saved or is it dead for good.

By: Ingo

Ingo — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:45:43 +0000

THANK YOU! This is excellent and with your video it took me 5 minutes to open my dead My Book Essentials.

My Book sounded very bad – clicking and restarting the drive continously. After removing the hard drive and connecting it with a USB to SATA adapter it worked! I was able to backup all data. Now lets see, what the WD warranty says to the condition of the case.

By: jack

jack — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 10:55:19 +0000

Thank you very much!!!

By: James

James — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 01:27:19 +0000

Hello everyone: Great news!
PC Connection kindly exchanged my used-once WD 3-way 1TB MyBook for a WD Caviar SATA 1TB and now, happily using their iSTAR SATA-USB Drive Dock (3.5/2.5"). Works perfectly with drive jumper for 1.50 Gbps rate with my Intel chipset ICH5 (see Jun 20 entry above for conflict details).

They courteously acknowledged my several email xchngs w/ Intel, WD and their Tech Support to 'make my case' about unreported, unforewarned incompatibility. So relieved! Mailed personal thank you letter to their pres, Mrs. Patricia Gallup.

Only cost another $30 for this dock and though it's not as 'consumer-appliance looking' (Westerners – are we spoiled?), still a nice design. Usefully, accomodates 2.5" size notebook drives, as they hopefully increase in capacity.

PC Connection Item# 9179609 $27.30
iSTAR USA, Inc. Mfr# XAGE-N99-SAU

Or for their low price ext drive enclosures (aluminum)…
Macally Item# 8444407 Mfr# T-S350SU $17.74
Silver MicroPac Tech, Item# 8530882 Mfr# EC-ESTS $16.43

Have never worked for nor know anyone personally at PC Conn. Just a consumer who nearly got stuck with a SATAII-incompatbl drive, because of my reliable PC from 2005.

Thank You God! And ask His help if you get in trouble – His assurance enabled me to write a peaceful, appeal to PC Conn. Thanks Carlton for your site which helped me the most of any, in case an exchange fell thru, and 'surgery' needed.
Still praying for vendors to forewarn and WD to change their comm board design.

Isleton, CA

By: Tomas

Tomas — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 13:17:00 +0000

Hi there!
Thank you for the how to, it helped a lot!

According this , now I know a better way how to open it up, without any scratches or damaging the holding "pins".

Just use the same credit cards like on the front, for the bottom sides (first open up the fronts)… and it will open up perfectly.

I´ve found this out after opening mine – damaged one of the pins so I´m screwed, no warranty anymore… but might help somebody else!

The drive inside is ok, just the power cord is DEAD and got the electronics to some deep sleep – I´ve used the J6 and placed another drive inside (Seagate) , after that verifying the board is ok, putting back the WD drive – all running like before!!!

By: pm

pm — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 12:40:21 +0000

thanks for your reply carlton. i know. without plastic enclosure is zero chance. but WDC offers warranty service – pre-mailer. they send in advance a new my book, and then you send a damaged item within 30 days back. I would like to use the plastic housing from the new my book, insert damaged drive inside and send it back. I will have at least a functional internal drive….. just not remember whether it is not on the housing the serial number of the disk inside. It would be a problem …

By: Carlton Bale

Carlton Bale — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 12:03:02 +0000

Without the plastic drive enclosure, your chances of getting warranty repair are very low. You can try sending in the drive by itself, but I don't think it has any warranty. The only way to get warranty is to install that drive back into the enclosure and send that back to WD.

By: pm

pm — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 11:31:59 +0000

hello,
thanks for the great instructions! because it was opened without the slightest problem. disk I then used as internal. Now the drive broke down too. i hate wd!! unfortunately, now I cant find a plastic box / I guess my wife threw him out/. without it the claim is probably impossible.
I thought claim by pre-mailer service, dead disk inserted into received box and send back. But I do not remember if it's not on the factory label /otside the box/ indicated the serial number of the disk inside. can someone take pictures of the label on the box, or at least check? sorry for my bad english. thanks

By: mg

mg — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 18:16:41 +0000

Hello again, and thanks for the quick answer!
Today I received the new Caviar bought online days ago, it's almost identical to the original drive included with the MyBook Studio, the only difference is 32 MB cache instead of 16; I reassembled the enclosure with the new drive and it's working perfectly, so now I'm 100% sure the only broken part was the drive!

Conclusion: I'm ok with the new drive, but I'm still wondering how to reset the board for generic drives.. other users may be interested too, so if someone successfully reset it and wants to spend 2 minutes explaining using the pics in my previous post, it would be nice =)

Thanks again to Carlton and to everyone contributing here!