I've got a Western Digital "My Passport Essential SE 750GB" external USB 3.0 HDD.

 

Model # is WDBACX7500ABK.

 

It was working great for the past year. However it's developed an odd "quirk" - it is no longer recognized by any PC if it is hooked up to a USB 3.0 port. The activity light will come on and stay on when it is plugged into a USB 3.0 port, and I can tell it's spinning by the vibration/gyroscopic precession, but it never is recognized by the PC, and it does not appear in either device manager or disk manager on windows 7 systems.

 

If it is plugged into a USB 2.0 port though it works fine - instantly recognized and reads/writes without a problem.

 

If it is plugged into a USB 2.0 hub that is plugged into a USB 3.0 port, that's great too, works fine.

 

I have upgraded it to the latest firmware available from WD, but that seems to make no difference.

 

What gives!?

Change the cable? I had a cable go bad on my USB 3.0 external drive.

Ok, easy enough, I've got several other USB 3.0 drives I can swap cable out on, thanks for the idea.

 

So USB 3.0 uses more wires/circuit paths than USB 2.0?

Hmm...yeah check the cable. Odd, very odd.

Maybe tomorrow I'll take a picture of all the dead 2.5" hard drives I have sitting in my office.

 

All of them exhibited some quirk or another before they just stopped working.

 

I would pull the drive out of the clam shell it's in, stick it in a dock like a blacX or another enclosure and see if the problem continues. If it does, save your data elsewhere and start a warranty replacement from WD.

Gotta get a solid state drive. I put one in my Area-51 machine and love it...

 

 

Sent from John's iPad 2 via Tapatalk HD

Typos courtesy Apple...

Ok, easy enough, I've got several other USB 3.0 drives I can swap cable out on, thanks for the idea.

 

So USB 3.0 uses more wires/circuit paths than USB 2.0?

 

IIRC USB 2.0 is a 5 pin connector and 3.0 is a 9 pin connector

O would make sure the data is backed up ASAP, hdd tend to do funky stuff before they die. This is quote strange though.

Tried a cable from another USB 3.0 portable drive and now the "bad" HDD works fine on 3.0 ports. The cable appears to be the problem, thanks Nick, never would have thought of that.

Yes there are 5 additional pins on USB 3.0 -- 2 Tx (-,+), 2 Rx (-,+) and another ground (signal return/drain). The drain pin actually splits into 2 physical wires for the cable run -- within the sheaths of each shielded signal pair (Tx and Rx). I'm thinking you lost the signal drain - pin connection from a stress break within one of the connectors.