How to Fix a Slow WD External Hard Drive Without Losing Data

Issue: Slow transfer speed with WD External Hard Drive

"I have a three-year-old WD My Passport 1TB external hard drive that I've been using as a backup drive. Around a week ago, something unusual happened. The drive became incredibly slow, especially when I try to transfer data from my computer or open files on the HDD. Is this a serious issue? Is there any way to fix the slow transfer speed problem on my WD external hard drive? Please help."

If you're a user of WD Elements or WD My Passport (Ultra) external hard drive and currently experiencing slow transfer speed, slow response, or slow boot issues, read on. This article offers solutions to fix the slow WD external hard drive and introduces a Data Recovery Wizard tool solution to safeguard crucial data from damaged, inaccessible, or slow WD external drives.

What are the risks of using an external hard drive slowly?

If your hard drive suddenly becomes very slow without any warning or error messages, beware! There are a few potential hazards that can cause serious damage to the drive and the data it stores.

Here's a list of potential risks caused by a slow Western Digital external hard drive:

1. The hard drive starts making clicking sounds or other unusual noises. 2. Files become inaccessible or corrupted, unable to open. 3. Windows no longer detects the hard drive or displays data from it. 4. The hard drive frequently crashes, stalls, hangs, or freezes when you attempt to open files by double-clicking its icon.

8 Ways to Fix Slow and Unresponsive WD External Hard Drive [UTF-8]

If your data is well protected (we'll get to that later), you can now start trying out various possible solutions to fix the slow WD external hard drive problem. We've rounded up eight workable solutions for you.

1. Replace the SATA data cable. 2. Switch from a USB 2.0 port to a USB 3.0 port. 3. Defragment the disk to optimize hard drive performance. 4. Check and repair logical errors and bad sectors on the hard drive. 5. Send the hard drive to a professional data recovery center or directly replace the slow hard drive with a new one. 6. Directly replace the slow hard drive with a new one.

Next, we're going to talk about the seventh and eighth, which are ones that anybody can really easily test on their own computer.

7. How to Optimize a Slow WD External Hard Drive

Step 1: Access My Computer (Windows 7) or This PC (Windows 10). Step 2: Right-click on the slow WD external hard drive and select Properties. Step 3: Choose the Tools tab, then click on Optimize. Step 4: Follow the wizard on the screen to complete the process.

Check and fix hard drive errors

Defragmenting your disks can optimize them to run more efficiently, which is one of the most common ways to speed up a hard drive that has suddenly slowed down or become bogged down.

8. Check and repair hard disk bad sectors

Step 1. Similarly, open the Properties window of the WD external hard drive.
Step 2. Go to the Tools tab and this time click on Check. (This option will scan the drive for any filesystem errors that might be affecting its performance)
Step 3. Follow the on-screen wizard to complete the filesystem check and repair process.

If Slow Start prevents you from trying these troubleshooting techniques, further inspect the drive's LED – is it flashing as it should? Or can Windows detect the drive at all? If not, it's time to take the drive to a professional repair center, or contact WD Support for assistance. Your drive appears to be severely damaged and have lost its basic functionality.

How can I prevent data from becoming corrupted or inaccessible on a slow hard drive?

When you encounter a slow hard drive, whether it's manufactured by Western Digital or another brand like SanDisk, Toshiba, Kingston, or Samsung, you should act promptly to protect your data from corruption.

The best solution is to use a professional data recovery tool like the “Data Recovery Wizard” to access the data on the WD external hard drive that won't open. It's the most professional Data Recovery Wizard tool that can help WD users find all their wanted data back with only 3 simple steps.

Step 1: Select and scan the external hard drive

• Download and install the Data Recovery tool on your desktop or laptop.
• Connect the external hard drive to your computer.
• Run the Data Recovery wizard, select the external hard drive from the list of external drives, and then click Scan for lost data.

Step 2: Check the scan results

• Data recovery software will immediately scan all data on the selected drive, including deleted, corrupted, and existing data.
• You can use the filter feature to quickly locate a specific type of file, such as images, Word, Excel, PDF, videos, emails, and more.

Step 3: Preview and recover the data

• Double click a file from the scan results to preview it.
• Select the files you need and then click "Recover".
• Choose another drive to save the recovered files instead of the original location.

As a precaution, you could also try cloning the problematic external hard drive, which would minimize the risk of data loss even further.

You can also watch this video tutorial to learn how to recover data from an external hard drive.

People also ask

1. How do I fix a slow external hard drive?

As the troubleshooting guide shows, there are five ways to fix a slow external hard drive on your own:

1. Replace the SATA data cable. 2. Switch from a USB 2.0 port to a USB 3.0 port. 3. Defragment the hard drive to optimize its performance. 4. Check and repair logical errors and bad sectors on the hard drive. 5. Send the hard drive to a professional repair center or replace it with a new one.

2. Why Has My Hard Drive Suddenly Become Slow?

The problem usually boils down to two things: bad software and a damaged hard drive. Once the health of your hard drive and its associated software start to deteriorate, you begin to experience issues like bad sectors, viruses, fragmentation, and ultimately, extremely slow data transfer rates that can affect your work and life. Learn how to fix an issue where your hard drive has suddenly become very slow.

3. How can I increase the transfer speed of an external hard drive?

Sometimes, converting FAT32 to NTFS might help increase transfer speed. Also, consider changing the default hardware settings for better performance.

< strong > 4. Will an external hard drive make my computer run faster?

The purpose of an external hard drive is to provide your computer with more space to store and run files, especially larger ones like videos, photos, Photoshop projects, and so on. As such, it can help speed up your computer in certain situations, but it's uncertain that it would speed up the system overall.