Hard drive not recognized in Linux Mint Solved

Question

Hello, I have 2 external hard drives: 1 Western Digital 1 TB, and 1 Iomega 250 GB.

When I connect them to the PC (one at a time), they light up, and I can feel the disks spinning in the enclosures, but the PC doesn't recognize them!

What I've already tried:
- plugging and unplugging each HDD on the PC: no result
- restarting the PC with one HDD plugged in: no result
- entering " ls /dev/ > /home/ubuntu/liste-dev2.txt " in the terminal: nothing
- entering " lsusb ": nothing

In no case have I been able to see either of these 2 HDDs on my PC. I tried on a 2nd PC running Linux, same result.

What can I do? Thank you.

Another thing: I think that a solution would be to format or reformat these 2 HDDs, but I suppose that would lead to data loss... ?

Clarification: these 2 HDDs do not belong to me, so I do not know how long they have been broken...

Configuration: Linux / Firefox 82.0

zipe31 · Answer

Hi,

Unplug the 2 disks.
Open a terminal.
Type the command
```
dmesg -w
```
Press the <Enter> key 3 or 4 times to create some blank lines
Plug in one of the 2 disks
Report back to us (copy/paste) the new lines that appeared in the terminal

--
_______________________________ ☯ Zen my nuggets ☮ _____________________________
Do a favor for the environment, close your windows and adopt a penguin… ????

jeannets · Answer

Hello,

The main question is whether this disk is recognized by the PC in the BIOS.

If it is not recognized in the BIOS, it won't be recognized in Windows or Mint (Linux) either.

That's the first thing to check... The disk can be "spinning" and still be completely faulty...

Provide more details about your PC, make and model, and the same for each disk...

Have these disks ever worked on this PC?? It might very well not have enough power... If it is powered via USB, that is quite likely... you need USB ports with external power or "Y" USB cables.

Be patient before jumping to formatting without knowing anything else... especially since this is your first POST.

jeannets · Answer

Alright, it's possible, but without knowing which disks are involved, I can't say.

All these attempts are a waste of time; if the disks are not visible in the BIOS, that's the first thing to know before trying anything else.

MAC disks are often not recognized under Windows, depending on their age and the operating system.

You could try the utility software from the disk manufacturer, on CDlive here for WD.

https://downloads.wdc.com/wdapp/WDDriveUtilitiesSetup_for_web_2.0.0.76.zip
https://downloads.wdc.com/windlg/WinDlg_v1_37.zip

WalterP · Answer

Ok jeannets  The hard drives are: 1 WesternDigital 1 TB, and 1 iomega 250 GB.  My PC is running Linux Mint.  I tried, I can't access the BIOS when either of the two hard drives is connected to my PC. The PC doesn't shut down (so I have to do it manually), and upon restarting, I can't enter the BIOS because the hard drive is connected. To check, I disconnected the hard drive and was able to access the BIOS normally with the F2 key. My two hard drives must have a big problem! In my opinion, it's doomed.  I'll check the two links you gave me above.  Thanks jeannets

jeannets · Answer

All PCs have a BIOS and you can access it, you need to be quick... select the key before the brand logo disappears... during a real boot, not a wake-up...

What’s your PC..? (Brand and model or at least the model of the motherboard) I had already asked for that in my POST 2

and the drives too... you give the brand, not the model... Western Digital makes thousands of models and IOMEGA does too...

WalterP · Answer

My PC is an Asus X73SD, with 1 Iomega hard drive model LPHD-UP and 1 Western Digital hard drive model My Passport (WDBKXH, WDBY8L).

As mentioned above, when a hard drive is connected: 1) the PC no longer shuts down and 2) the F2 key does not respond during startup. To check, I unplugged the hard drive and access the BIOS normally with the F2 key.

Yes, I do a proper startup, with the PC off.

I just tried on another PC (Lenovo), and again, when a hard drive is connected, I cannot access the BIOS. The PC hangs on the brand logo. And as on my Asus, if I unplug the hard drive, I can access the BIOS (with the F1 key for the Lenovo). I am doing real startups from the PC being off.

In my opinion, these 2 hard drives are faulty...

jeannets · Answer

Yes, I think so too, they are in really bad shape... They may not have been turned on for a long time..??

I think the BIOS is freezing while waiting to recognize the external drive... we may need to wait longer...??
There are indeed types of hard drive failures that can freeze the PC or make it extremely slow... Access time of minutes.

The WD drive is a USB3, so it might need to be connected only via USB3..? and your PC might not be in USB3 mode during the BIOS startup... The PC only becomes USB3 after Windows loads which contains the required drivers...?? that's a possibility.
Furthermore, this disk is manufactured with a native USB interface, it's not a SATA drive placed in an enclosure... so we cannot place it in a tower as an internal drive to test it better.

The Iomega model LPHD-UP is often seen on MAC and is not recognized on Windows... But above all, this drive consumes quite a bit of power, in fact, it comes with an external power adapter for this reason.. Otherwise, one solution is to connect it to the PC with a "Y" cable with 2 USB plugs to double the power... PCs cannot provide enough power through USB ports, especially laptops.

Go read this http://www.latelierducable.com/cable/cable-usb/le-cable-usb-double-ou-en-y-pourquoi-faire/

like this one https://www.cdiscount.com/informatique/cables-connectiques/cabling-cable-y-usb-pour-disque-dur-externe-do/f-1072003-auc3333336714837.html?idOffre=11307019#mpos=0|mp

It is possible that the case of the IOMEGA is not the same as the WD...

jeannets · Answer

It is possible that under Mint or "Linux" you do not have operational USB3 drivers..

If these two disks were used on MAC... a long time ago, it can only complicate things under LINUX...

Linux Ubuntu can read and write in HFS and non-journaled HFS+ file systems. (A journaled HFS+ file system can only be read by Ubuntu.) not on MAC... There may be incompatibilities of this kind between the two systems depending on the formatting used and also the rights granted... which add to the other problems
the disks also have a UUID which will not be the same on another PC and another system..

In any case, even if it is possible to recover the disk, it will be nearly impossible to recover the files it contains under these conditions.

Hard drive not recognized in Linux Mint

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