External hard drive spins but doesn't recognize

[HugginItOut]

Hey guys, hopefully someone knows something I can try. The drive is a Western Digital Elements WDE1U5000N 500GB. The problem is that the drive turns on and spins, but windows never says installing new hardware or anything like that.

After googling:
I've tried connecting it on 3 different PC's all running Windows xp sp3.
It's not the USB cable.
Cannot see it in disk managment.
Disabling 1394 port doesn't make it work.
Tried to connect it into a wall outlet instead of a surge protector as well.

Think it's just dead? Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

 

[DonDon]

Well, if you really need the data, you can try removing the drive from the enclosure and connecting straight to the mobo connector, but that will generally void the warranty.

If you send it in for repair it will not have your data on it when it returns.

Don

 

[SJetski71]

I've seen this with USB externals twice now. It won't show up in disk management, but it does show up in the device manager and the drives would even spin ... usually.

Both times i yanked them out of the case and installed them inside a PC, and both times the drives were dead.

Hopefully i'm wrong in your case.