in the same week, I’ve had 3 computers fail to turn on when being connected to my two external HDDs. The drives are a LaCie 500Gb and an IBM 250 Gb in an OWC case. Both connect through Firewire 800 or eSata. The HDDs and the desktop computers have always been connected through a good non back-up surge protector.
The ex.HDDs have been continuously connected but lightly used since 2011. They are daisy chained to each other by firewire 800. Internet access has been turned off for the last 5 years.
First failure— My 2011 iMac failed to turn on one morning. Second failure— I connected my 2012 mac laptop to the HDDs as the laptop was booting. Third failure—After setting up a “new” OWC 2015 iMac connected to the same ex. HDDs, it failed to restart after several restarts.
What would you do? Test the drives or just extract the data for new drives?
I was thinking transient voltage spikes caused by one of the hard disk drives.
What type of test and what type of test professional should I look for to test the HDDs? Voltage spikes? Apple certified repair can’t test the HDDs, only extract the data.
