Dead thumb drive

Ok so I have a 64G Sandisk USB drive that's dead as a doornail. I've inserted it into every USB port on 4 computers, Win 7x2, 10 and an older Lubuntu laptop I've got lying around.

It makes the usual device plugged in sound when inserted but then a second later I get the uplugged sound and no access to the drive. It shows up in my file manager but with a message that the drive is inaccessible.

I did get a message from the Linux computer though but it's almost all Greek to me. Maybe someone here can decipher it.... (It does say to run chkdsk /f but I can't do that since Windows can't access it.)

thanks

https://discussions.virtualdr.com/im.../2020/10/2.jpg

Are you looking to recover files from this drive, or just make it usable again?

You may be able to use you Linux computer to get it working. See the links below:

https://askubuntu.com/questions/1839...h-exit-code-13

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/...h-exit-code-13

Recover the files. I'll look at those links. tnks

For file recovery, check the link below:

https://www.techradar.com/best/best-...overy-software

https://recoverit.wondershare.com/fl...-recovery.html

Recuva and EaseUS might be useful.

I have Recuva and I tried using a half dozen other file recovery programs on a Hiren's boot disk but none of them can actually see the drive. It also doesn't show up in any of the Hiren's file/disk/partition programs. I have a strong feeling it's toast.

It could well be a hardware failure that is not allowing any Read operations to complete. If you really needed the data, it might be possible to transplant the actual memory chip to a working drive of the same make and model, although that would require some delicate surgery.

Yeah.. it's one of those teeny tiny drives that are all included inside the metal jack casing. I've taken it apart but there's no actual visible solder points.

One of these. I needed it that small because I used it on a laptop at work that moved around from place to place and a regular sized key would have been knocked out or easily damaged. It contains a lot of live music and comedy shows that were recorded at the club so I would be very hesitant to give it to a repair shop because if they decided to make copies of the files the artists, some of them quite well known, who actually own the material would be very upset that they'd become public.

The components might be encapsulated.

If you really need that data and have some $$$$, you could send it to OnTrack. If anyone can recover the data, they probably can.

I don't actually need them they were just shows that I'd like to have kept for nostalgic reasons but not enough to spend real cash on LOL.

Well that was interesting. About a dozen years ago I had a HDD that suddenly stopped working. I tried the old trick of sticking it in the freezer for a few hours and sure enough I got it working for a good two hours to be able to grab files off of it.

So yesterday I thought to myself, for no particular reason, why don't I stick the thumb drive in the freezer. To be clear there's nothing I've ever seen suggesting to do that with a dead usb stick esp since there are no moving parts to contract and help a disk spin freely for a period of time.

I left it in for about an hour, plugged it in and sure enough I was able to access it. But only for about 30 seconds before it warmed up and went dead again. Tried it a few times and the same thing happened every time. I'm guessing there's a fault inside the mem chip or on the tiny circuit board it's attached to that contracted and made contact when it was cooled. Sooo how to keep it cool out of the freezer?

I went to my local computer store and bought a short USB cable extender, plugged the drive into the female end and the other into the PC. I then filled a small bowl with water and ice cubes, wrapped the drive in a thin plastic bag and immersed the whole thing into the cold water.

It worked! It fired up and stayed live. I was able to copy all the files I wanted off of the drive. So bizarre.

WOW... That's one for the record books.

I've done some more searching now that I've found that heat is an issue and apparently it's a known problem with these specific drives. Some in this 6 year old Sandisk thread tried cooling them with blowing air or drilling tiny holes in the mini-case but with very limited success.

https://forums.sandisk.com/t/ultra-f...ive-heat/33099

Thanks for the update with the useful information.

I had a similar problem last year. Out of inexperience, I formatted the SD card, which contained photos and other important files. We connected it to a PC and scanned it with Uneraser. This program helped to recover almost all important files. But sometimes mechanical recovery of the drive may be necessary.