jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

After formatting a WD Black drive, I was surprised to see the capacity listed as 163.8TB, especially since the label said 3TB. About a year ago, WD sent me a "Recertified" drive to replace one that failed under warranty. I didn't have a need for it at the time, so it sat on a shelf. A couple of days ago, I decided to add it to my computer. The computer wouldn't recognize it. Then someone reminded me that I had to format it. Going to Disk Management, I selected Format and let it run while I was gone for the day.

When I returned eight hours later, it was still formatting (Quick format) and showing 163.8TB. Not a good sign. I stopped the formatting, but I was unable to access it. I tend to waste a lot of time on dead-end projects, so after two days of playing with this, I have temporarily given up. I tried formatting it again in different computers, internally and externally. I even used DiskPart, which showed the progress in %. It shows up in This PC as Local Drive (H), but I can't access it. I get an error message. I've used programs that let me get more into the details of the drive, so I'll look for them and try again some day.

In the meantime, I opened up my 8TB WD Red NAS easyshare external drive and installed that in my computer. Someone on UHH posted that this drive was on sale for about $150 a while back - a great deal.

If any of you have suggestions for dealing with this 3TB WD drive, I'd be glad to try them.

PixelStan77 Loc: Vermont/Chicago

Jerry, I would call Western digital. Sounds like they sent you a bad unit.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Could be, but it's been over a year. It's dated Oct 17, 2016. The warranty on the original has expired by now.

Joe Blow

Even if the warranty has expired, they may have a trick or two that can boot the drive into working order. At the worse you spend an hour of your life on hold. At best, you bring a HDD back from the dead.

marine1960

Round file???

jimq Loc: Cape Cod, MA

Sometimes when a drive has been sitting for a very long time, the heads stick to the drive surface. The motor might not be able to break them free. Try this trick- hold the drive by one corner and flick it like you're going to throw a Frisbee, DON'T let go. I have done this with drives that exhibit similar symptoms, and they come back to life. Good Luck.

HOHIMER

Try the old freezer trick.

Steve_m Loc: Southern California

The heads never touch the surface.

Bmarsh Loc: Bellaire, MI

You didn’t mention whether you tried re-writing the partition table... I would have done that first.

ebbote Loc: Hockley, Texas

Jerry, I believe WD Blacks have a 3 year warranty on them.

chrissybabe Loc: New Zealand

WD Blacks have a three year warranty which is usually dated from end user purchase. If nothing else at least it should have a 3 year warranty dated from manufacture date. There are a few exceptions however. If the drive was a replacement for one sent back for for warranty then the new drive only has a warranty which finishes when the original drives one would have. Example if the original drive was sent back after 2 years 9 months then the replacement would only have 3 months warranty remaining. So in spite of looking if it still has some time to go (about another 18 months odd) it really hasn't as you appear to be aware of from your second post. Personally I think this stinks but that is the way it is. The moral of the story is ALWAYS check a replacement drive immediately you receive it even if you aren't going to use it. It also follows that if a drive is purchased as a spare it also still needs checking on arrival and if you have any sense once a year until its warranty expires. The number of times I have seen dead spares is legend.

chrissybabe Loc: New Zealand

Actually I guess it doesn't really stink as manfs need to protect themselves from permanently replacing drives which fail at 2 years 11 months thus making the drives "immortal". What stinks is that they have to do this to protect themselves from those who would take advantage of the situation.

JerryOSF Loc: Bristol, VA

Linux (which everyone seems to pooh pooh) has great disk forensic programs. If you can't get it to work, send it to me. If I get it working I will return it. You provide the postage. Otherwise, send it to me COD. If I fix it, I keep it, otherwise it becomes an anchor.

Bmarsh Loc: Bellaire, MI

Not so... gparted is excellent and the first thing I would do would be to put a new partition table on it...

(Been using Linux for 24 years now)