I have an external HD that I want to format. The disk doesn't appear in the device list, neither in xp, nor in Windows7. Here's what I did so far:
Ubuntu: Ubuntu sees it but I can't mount it, nor format it, I've tried many times. Gives me an error every single time, besides It's listed in disk management but not in gparted.
Windows 7: The 'initialize disk' option under 'disk management' in windows 7 is greyed out so it's useless. Same for format, diskpart, scandisk, defrag, etc. I can't do anything via cmd because windows can't see the hd.
External Software: Acronis Disk Director sees the disk, the column on the left says 'initialize disk'. I click ok. But the operation stops middway because of an error. It says the disk is write-protected.
So I downloaded usb writeprotector by gaijin and here's the thing: it worked the first time. I was able to remove the protection, initialize the disk with acronis, it appeared in the device list so I could format it and then re-load backed up data on it. I safely removed it in the evening but when I connected it again in the morning it was gone again.
Back to square one. I re-did all I did the first time but somehow it doesn't work anymore. I even used a different software instead of usb writeprotector (tried USB Disk Manager) but no luck. I'm sure it's the disk and not my computer because it behaved the same way on three different machines.
The disk is not mine so I don't know what the did on it, I don't care about the data on it because I have a backup of everything. I just want to be able to use the disk again (just maybe not as an external backup drive because I don't trust it that much now)
Oh, and I gave it to a friend to see if he could disassemble it and attach it directly inside his comp but he says it's neither IDE, nor SATA so he can't do anything.