Western Digital My Book Essential Edition 500 GB

I don't want to seem too simplistic, but before taking any drastic measure, try the following: with the firewire cable disconnected, plug the DC in and then connect the drive with the computer (should be on) using the firewire. I hope it helps.

The 500gb is RAID, at least the one i bought yesterday is, the drive or drives out and install them in the other enclosure and try using that, you must move any and all drives in the my book at the same time, if there are more than one then it is RAID and the data is spread across both drives(files can be half on one drive and half on the other or and other combination of fractions) if you don't think your up to the task of cracking these open and possibly voiding any warranty you may have then by all means do not, have someone with experience with this do it for you if possible or else at the very least egister the product on western digital's website and see if it has a warranty and get it replaced or upgraded, the latter will probably cost some cash but you will get a discount for upgrading old hardware.this may not be much help but its about the best i could offer over the internet, hopefully this helps you or someone at least a little

Hi Bawhee, Following is the link which will help you dismantle the case and will enable you to pull the hard drive out of it, you can either then submit the case to Western digital for repair or check for yourself, hopefully the data shud be safe, cause the hard drive case by WD uses a power unit of its own independent of the drive. http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=1464&p_created=1158253904&p_sid=B*O5p2Ci&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9NzgmcF9wcm9kcz0yMDksMCZwX2NhdHM9MTIzJnBfcHY9MS4yMDkmcF9jdj0xLjEyMyZwX3NlYXJjaF90eXBlPWFuc3dlcnMuc2VhcmNoX2ZubCZwX3BhZ2U9NA**&p_li=&p_topview=1 You can, after dismantling pull out the SATA hard drive and either plug it in directly into your computer or the other wd unit you have by replacing the hard drive inside it. There are more instructions on the WD site if this MYBOOK was part of a RAID. Hope it helps Mutahir