This is a common problem with external hard drives like the Western Digital My Book. The reason is that we as a USB using public do not “Safely Remove” the hardware before we turn off or unplug the devices from our computers. A lot of the time this is due to the fact that Windows will not allow us to safely remove the drive. We get an error that says the device is still in use by some ghost application. This seems to be less and less of problem with the release of Windows 7. When we remove the device improperly there is always a chance that the cached data will be dumped somewhere inconvenient and a lot of times that area is going to be the “system area” or what is also referred to as the MBR or the OS Boot Sector. Why does the data dump choose to go there? I have to come to believe over the years that it is because some coder somewhere thought it would be funny.
How do I fix it you ask? There are couple of different ways. The first way would be to download a piece of recovery software, something like Recover It All, let it scan and then move the data off to another hard drive. After you move all the data it would then be safe to format your external hard drive and move the data back. This method is the tried and true method of data recovery, but it is time intensive and requires that you have another drive with enough storage to hold the data. The other problem I foresee is that you may also miss an important file.
There is another option though, and that is the Recover It Now service we offer. With this service I use LogMeIn to come into the machine remotely. I load my tools on to your machine and then fix the drive on the fly. When all is said and done you will be back up and running like crash never happened. I can also offer diagnostic analysis of the hard drive for free as well as point you in the right direction of what recovery software will be the best option.
If you want to discuss the options please give me a call at 727.345.9665 ext 236 and I will be happy to help!
About Jacqui Best