Initialize disk failed due to a fatal device hardware error disk unknown not initialized.

Question

I am trying to fix a WD Elements 3TB portable hard drive that belongs to my sister it has worked fine until recently but will no longer come up on her MacBook Pro or iMac. I connected it to my HP laptop and clicked This PC but it does not show up in the devices and drives section when you select disk management it shows up as unknown not initialized and requests you to initialize disk but when you do it fails due to a fatal device hardware error. Any help would be greatly received. I have attached some screenshots showing the messages I am getting.

Answer 1

Hello there, this is Emily.

Based on the issue you described, it is very likely to be a hardware issue with the WD itself, considering it doesn't work on any device, and the error message suggests hardware issue.

Normally there's command to run to check health status of the drive, but without having the drive letter assigned at this moment, none of those commands will help in your situation.

I will definitely recommend you seek out local repair or contact WD support. I don't think this is an issue that can be resolved as a Windows issue. I am sorry. Good luck!

Answer 2

Thanks for the reply and your advice I did contact Western Digital about the issue and they told me to download WD Digital Dashboard and check the status of the drive using that. When I first used it the drive would just come up as not supported but after leaving it connected for some time it did come up and all the tests I did came back as being normal. But now I can't get it to connect to the WD Dashboard at all very frustrating looks to be a lost cause at the stage. Thanks again for your time.

Answer 3

Perhaps it is an intermittent issue considering the Disk Management could also see it, but intiliazing it didn't go through. Maybe run that same WD dashboard app on the on the macbook?

I am sorry.. it just doesn't look good!

Answer 4

I thought about running the WD Dashboard on my sisters MacBook but it does not work on Mac systems just Windows based computers.

Thanks for your time and help though it is much appreciated.

Answer 5

You are welcome. Good luck to you!