If it works on the TV and not on your laptop, I'd start trying with a few other laptops or PC's. One of them might work and let you get your data out.
If no luck, read the sticky of the storage forum: http://forums.cnet.com/7723-7588_102-354911.html?tag=threadListing;forum-threads
It's all about data recovery.
And, yes, we see a lot of people here that think an external drive is suitable for storage of the only copy of their data. It isn't. It's quite useful as a means to transport data across computers that aren't networked. And it's quite useful as a quick (but not the only!) backup medium for data on your internal hard disk. And that's about all it offers.
Those people with those wrong thought often lose their data or they pay a lot of money to a professional data recovery company.
Kees
Hi, can somebody please help me, I am definitely a computer newbie and i have a WD 1.5 Terabyte external hard drive with alot of my personal files on it that all of a sudden can not be accessed by my laptop? when its plugged in to any of the 3 USB ports, nothing comes up on my computer until i unplug the external from the laptop and it says it must be reformatted before i can use it? it can be read on my TV when its plugged into its USB port but not on my laptop? can anyone help please? as i need programes from my laptop to access alot of my files on the external.
also it has done this before, but magically was back to normal after i retried it a few times, but this time it doesnt seem to want to return to its normal state. if that helps.
Thanks guys.
Compaq Presario CQ61 Notebook PC / 406TU
Windows 7

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