Samsung SSD 840 EVO, computer shows as 0GB

I have a Samsung SSD 840 EVO (250GB) on which I previously cloned Windows 7 Home Premium. After a while the drive appeared corrupt and Windows would only start with errors, if at all. I decided to re-clone but apparently I formatted the drive instead. Now it shows as two partitioned drives, one showing 305MB free of 399MB, and the other showing as 0GB capacity. However, device manager still recognizes the drive as the original 250GB amount.

I attempted to restore the firmware using the Samsung support website, under "Performance Restoration." But I receive an error stating that at least 10% of the SSD needs to be free space (10% of zero is still zero). When I click start, I receive another message there may be a third party driver in use.

How do I make the SSD usable again? I am connecting it via USB with a Dell Inspiron I14Z-8339DBK laptop. Thanks so much!!

 

I would hook it up as an internal if at all possible and try:
http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/parted_magic.html

 

If you have an Intel SATA chipset, connect it to that. Check what 3rd party apps are installed/running (Process Explorer will show all .dlls loading with an .exe, DriverView (Nirsoft) will show all drivers loaded) and reduce them (uninstall non-vital 3rd party stuff) to as close as you can to a vanilla install.

Once you have access to it in any way, check that it has the latest firmware installed - the Samsung software should deal with that.

Let us know how you get on - paste the software name in the top right search box here to find and download it: http://www.majorgeeks.com/