I also have a 2 TB WD Elements Portable external hard drive, unfortunately as I picked it up from its last use I noticed the USB plug hole had broken USB connector on the board inside. I can hear it rattling inside the case. I have not dropped it. What should I do as with the similar post yesterday from justine20133 seems to be a possible weakness point. I thought of removing the back from the case but does seem to be a sealed unit with no screw holes. Is there a way to save this drive as I have have a lot of photos 18000 + and documents I have collected collected over the years that are impossible to replace similarly please don’t tell me I should have backed them up as I have now only this as my backup plus the SD cards out of my camera but there was a lot more.
First opening the case voids the warranty. An Elements is a plain drive and does not have the encryption like the drives that come with Smartware. It might connect and be recognized as an internal or in another enclosure. You can try having the port soldered back on or look for a board on ebay. This link explains a bit about the boards http://community.wd.com/t5/Off-Topic-Discussions/Bridge-Boards/td-p/353839 If you look on YouTube you might find a vidoe showing how to open.
Joe
