WD Passport sometimes recognizing and sometimes not

WD External Drives WD Portable Drives
1

I have been using my WD Passport for roughly 1-2months just storing videos, musics, and pictures. So far it has been working great for the past couple of months, but recently when I plugged it into my laptop (same laptop as always), it will not start up. It shows that the device is being recognized under device manager, but unable to access the data under any of the drives. Also, under device manager, it is listed as a USB Mass Storage and not under disk with WD Passport like when it is working. I have 4  3.0Usb ports and have been trying them all, sometimes it works perfectly in one, safely removing it, plugging it back into the same one and it will not work again. 

The data is still on the hard drive since the fleeting moments that I do get it to recognize, I can still see the folders/files are still there and the videos are still present and watchable. It just started recently when I was transferring data into my hard drive and it just completely disappeared on my laptop during the transferring of the data. I tried to look for it, but waited a couple of minutes until when I thought the transfer was over. I have tried uninstalling/installing it back in and it works, once, and then went back to doing what it did before with the error. Any tips and advice would be greatly appreciated thanks. 

Side Note: i do not have any other computer to test this on in the house atm, but it use to work on my laptop for the past 1-2 months flawlessly and I have not done anything different to change any settings on it.

2

Hello,

This could be related to a power issue on the computer, If it is not providing enough power to spin up the drive it wont recognize it. I recommend that you contact support directly so they can send you a power booster cable (Y-cable)

http://support.wd.com/contact/contact.asp?lang=en

3

I had the almost identical issue.  I own two of these 2 Tb My Passports; both were working perfectly on my 6 year old Toshiba notebook, even at the same time.  Took one overseas with 1.6 Gb data and for about 2 weeks was transferring and using it with no issues on a new Dell notebook.  Then, all of a sudden, it started giving problems like you say.  As of today, i can get the computer to recognize it, and it will copy files VERY slowly … I am now moving 7 Gb of files off the drive, which should take 10 minutes perhaps, and it will ultimately take about 10 hours when (and if) it finally completes.   The files transfer correctly, however, and the data appears all intact.  Sometimes, the drive is not recognized at all; other times it is, and i can get directories, etc.    I have another 1 Tb to move off this drive, so wish me luck!

It seems odd that it would be working perfectly fine for a few weeks on various USB ports on the computer, and now almost not at all.  Clearly it can not be a power problem since it was functioning fine for weeks, and i see the same problem on all of the USB ports, with no other USB products attached.  

Since I see similar problems in the community, there must be something else going on.