My western digital elements 1tb drive stopped being recognized by my pc. It says device not recognized or malfunctioned. The drive spins as normal, just cant be read. I did unplug the drive without using the "safely remove hardware" quite a few times, I don't know if that caused it. I spoke with wd and they offered to replace the drive but all my data will be lost unless I pay some company over $1000 to recover it. I heard that these drives can be opened and placed internally to see if they still work, but if i do this I void my warranty. What should I do? Thanks
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