So I was trying to plug off my mouse, and my 1.5tb hard disk glided off the edge and fell off my desk…
My desk is about 2 and a half feet high. It still connects to my pc but it takes a short while longer so I can still access the files and download into it, but the light is blinking and occasionally disappears, there is also a slight vibration when I touch it sometimes. I was wondering if I should be worried or if this is just something I have not paid attention to before. Should I buy a new one?
What specific drive model is it?
Are you saying you never noticed the blinking and vibration before? Does the light blink randomly and quickly or is it steady.
To be safe, buy another external drive then copy all your data to the new drive.
It’s probably OK assuming that the drive (a) wasn’t in operation and (b) landed on a soft carpet. Otherwise, I would take jebusx’s advice and migrate your files over to a new drive before problems arise, if you haven’t done so already.
Modern hard drives park the heads off of the platters, which in turn reduces damage due to shock. This will not completely protect the drive from severe shock damage, but should be good enough under acceptable limits. The hard drive should be mounted in place inside the enclosure with rubber grommets, which provide some extra shock absorption. If you’re in doubt and your data is irreplaceable, then consider replacing the drive.
