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Surface test does not see usb 3.0 HDD

Posted: 2020.05.09. 16:40
by Slender
Hello dear forum, I have a problem with the disk and software, when choosing surface test I do not see my problem disk, it just does not appear in the list.

Re: Surface test does not see usb 3.0 HDD

Posted: 2020.05.10. 20:03
by hdsentinel
Hello Slender,

Yes, this is possible when the disk drive has so serious problems and the surface (the disk sectors) no longer accessible.
Then I'm afraid the surface test (as it can't test/repair and generally access any sectors) is not possible at all, so the disk drive not listed there.

Usually this happens when the USB adapter/enclosure/docking station lost connection to the hard disk due to excessive amount of problems. Then in Hard Disk Sentinel you may still see the last detected status (the 0 % health in this case) but the hard disk drive is no longer accessible: for example Windows Disk Management also can't see/access the hard disk drive.

You may try a complete power cycle of the external USB HDD as sometimes it can help.

Re: Surface test does not see usb 3.0 HDD

Posted: 2020.05.11. 12:39
by Slender
Thank you for the answer, but the problem is that the disk was rarely used, I just accidentally wiped it and, after recovering the files, started a deep cleanup, and after that the disk stopped initializing and formatting

Re: Surface test does not see usb 3.0 HDD

Posted: 2020.05.13. 09:32
by hdsentinel
Sometimes the issue may be related to the USB 3.0 enclosure/docking station/converter: especially during intensive use (eg. a complete wipe / cleanup may be such use) the chip in the USB adapter may become unresponsive, so the hard disk drive connected and managed by that may be not available.
I'd try to wait some time and retry - or (if possible) try to connect the HDD differently: by using a different USB adapter/dock or connect directly to a SATA port, just to verify if there is any difference.

Re: Surface test does not see usb 3.0 HDD

Posted: 2020.05.16. 17:54
by Elephantino
I can confirm problems when reinitializing hard drives connected via USB. Sometimes it failes during the later stage of the process, but if I then connect the drive internally, it is absolutely fine.