Nearly New Seagate 25 Tb External Drive No Longer Accessible

Hi,
I purchased a 25 tb external HDD and moved basically everything I care about onto this huge drive. In about 4 months I suddenly cannot access the drive. My guess is it is virus/malware related. It has been running chkdsk for the past 12 days and nothing (no status update, etc) so far. I know, shame on me for no real backup plan. I have since purchased a second drive to ghost but I need to access this one first. This drive has only sat on my desk since I started using it. Never taken it anywhere. Has never been knocked or banged or dropped in any way. No reason it shouldn't work unless it picked up a virus of some kind.

This chkdsk thing seems like a total bust. Any suggestions?


Computer Profile Summary
Computer Name: Andycunninghamd (in WORKGROUP) — HP Pavilion Dad got for his birthday and had in his office
Profile Date: Sunday, December 14, 2025 6:38:37 PM
Advisor Version: 13.1
Windows Logon: Dad
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Personal Home Use Only
Operating System
Windows 10 Home (x64) Version 22H2 (build 19045.6466)
Install Language: English (United States)
System Locale: English (United States)
Installed: 6/25/2017 5:16:36 PM
Servicing Channel: General Availability
Boot Mode: UEFI with successful Secure Boot
System Model
HP 24-b217c
System Serial Number: 8CC7031DF7
Asset Tag: 8CC7031DF7
Enclosure Type: All-in-One
Processor a
2.40 gigahertz Intel Core i5-7400T
256 kilobyte primary memory cache
1 megabyte secondary memory cache
6 megabyte tertiary memory cache
64-bit ready
Multi-core (4 total)
Not hyper-threaded
Main Circuit Board b
Board: HP 82DC 1100
Serial Number: PGBKU0A8J614DM
Bus Clock: 100 megahertz
UEFI: AMI F.34 06/20/2019
Local Storage
10.00 Terabytes Usable Local Storage Capacity
5.71 Terabytes Local Storage Free Space

Internal Drives† Size Type Serial Number Drive# Status*
WDC WD10EZEX-60WN4A0 1.00 TB HDD WD-WCC6Y1VUN1SY 0 Healthy
USB Attached Drives
Elements 2667 5.00 TB HDD WX22D7122D5U 3 Healthy
Elements 2667 5.00 TB HDD WX12D71CJ6F3 1 Healthy
Expansion HDD 28.00 TB 00000000NT17SJZA 2 Healthy
My Passport 25E2 4.00 TB HDD WXV1EA519WUD 4 Healthy
Other Drives
hp PLDS DVDRW DU8AESH [Optical drive]

† Mouse over a drive model name for details
* Status reported only for SMART enabled drives
Memory c,d
11.89 Gigabytes Usable Installed Memory

Slot 'DIMM0' has 8 GB (serial number 347DEDC8)
Slot 'DIMM1' has 4 GB (serial number 92506125)

32 Gigabytes Maximum System Memory Capacity
Local Storage Volumes
c: (NTFS on drive 0) * 986.79 GB 114.08 GB free
d: (NTFS on drive 0) 12.09 GB 1.23 GB free
h: (NTFS on drive 4) 4.00 TB 1.79 TB free
l: (NTFS on drive 1) 5.00 TB 3.80 TB free
* Operating System is installed on c:
Network Storage Volumes
None detected
Users (mouse over user name for details)
local user accounts last logon
Dad 12/3/2025 4:37:02 AM (admin)
local system accounts
X Administrator 1/21/2017 3:51:37 PM (admin)
X DefaultAccount never
X Guest never
HomeGroupUser$ never
X WDAGUtilityAccount never
X Marks a disabled account; L Marks a locked account
Printers
Amyuni Document Converter 400 on nul:
Brother HL-L5100DN series on USB001
Foxit PhantomPDF Printer Driver on FOXIT_PDF:
Microsoft Print To PDF on PORTPROMPT:
Microsoft Shared Fax Driver on SHRFAX:
Microsoft XPS Document Writer v4 on PORTPROMPT:
Send to Microsoft OneNote 16 Driver on nul:
Controllers
Intel(R) 100 Series/C230 Chipset Family SATA AHCI Controller
Display
Intel(R) HD Graphics 630 [Display adapter]
NVIDIA GeForce 930MX [Display adapter]
HP ALL-in-One [Monitor] (24.0"vis, s/n LM238WF1-SLE1, January 2015)
Bus Adapters
Microsoft Storage Spaces Controller
Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller - 1.0 (Microsoft)
Multimedia
Intel(R) Display Audio
NVIDIA Virtual Audio Device (Wave Extensible) (WDM)
Realtek High Definition Audio
Steam Streaming Microphone
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Virus Protection
Malwarebytes Anti-Malware Version 5.4.5.226
Virus Definitions Version Up To Date
Last Disk Scan on Monday, December 8, 2025 2:29:19 PM
Realtime File Scanning On
Spybot - Search and Destroy
Virus Definitions Version Not Up To Date
Realtime File Scanning Off

 

start here..https://www.thewindowsclub.com/hard-drive-spinning-but-not-detected-on-windows-pc

 

Will do. Thanks.

 

Chkdsk is not working since they windows cannot access the drive. They say to get professional help if that fails. Thanks for you concern.

 

Are you sure the drive is genuine?

 

It's a Seagate drive purchased directly from their own website. It worked fine for nearly 4 months. Now explorer can see it but cannot access it.

 

If virus related, you could use a live linux disc, or USB drive to boot into and see if it can access the drive. Most virus' have no affect on linux ability to see the drive and its contents.

 

I'll try that. How do I do it?

 

Then it should be genuine.

 

Download a linux iso, something like Linux Rescue to your hard drive.
Then download Rufus. The portable version is great, with no install.
Plug in a USB drive, it needs to be bigger than the ISO you downloaded.
Start Rufus, select the USB stick in the drop-down list.
Then point it to the ISO you downloaded.
Select ‘MBR’ partition scheme, it will work with both both BIOS and UEFI.
Click on the start button and wait until it is finished.
Then the USB is ready to boot from.
Put it in the PC USB port.
If you know the key for the boot select menu on your pc you can do that, and select the USB and skip the next part.
Boot your PC into bios and then boot menu, and select the USB with linux on it to boot from.
It will boot into linux, and hopefully you can see the files on your drive.
BY the way, the external drive must be plugged in too before boot, to give best chance of seeing it.
This is only if it is virus related. If the drive is damaged, this will not work.

 

Have you also tried contacting Seagate tech support about the problem? As it should still be well in warranty.

Also check here on Major Geeks and Seagate's website for specific Seagate HDD tools/diagnostic/test/troubleshooting software/programs/apps.

Do you have another/different USB cable and even power supply you could test/try on the trouble drive? Just to see IF that might make a difference, like maybe a cable and/or supply might be defective.

 

Seagate said they would try a data recovery and if successful they would send my data back on an unwarranteed drive. I don't have confidence that they will try very hard to get my data back. I will look for other tools. I also tried different cables, different computers, etc.
Thanks for your suggestions.

 

There is the possiblity it's not the drive itself, but the enclosure which has failed.