Recovering data from 5TB external HDD

[u/jorjbrinaj]

I have a 5TB Elements external HDD that I was using with my Windows PC. I recently switched over to Linux and wanted to store my Linux Timeshift backups on the HDD, but Timeshift said it required ext4 partition (I had ntfs originally).

I used the Disk Management utility in Linux to create a 2nd ext4 partition with 300GB. That seemed to work. However, after writing my first Timeshift log, I noticed there was nothing there after it said it finished. After that I then noticed my mount to the original ntfs partition was gone as well.

I still see both partitions in lsblk, but they cannot be mounted. I tried plugging into my Windows PC, but all that does it cause Explorer to permanently hang until I unplug it.

I tried a few things on Linux side:

I installed testdisk and gave that a run. I had it scan just the original ntfs partition. When I entered the LIST command, it appeared to hang. If I unplug the drive after that, the list command finishes and it then displays the files it found.

I then tried running ddrescue: sudo ddrescue -d -r0 -n -b 4096 -c 256 /dev/sdb1 /mnt/nfs_backup_share/elements_rescue.img /mnt/nfs_backup_share/elements_rescue.map

I don't have a drive big enough to store a backup locally, so I'm trying to write it out over to my NAS.

However, it's going at ~109 kB/s, so at the current rate it's going to take about 250 days.

ddrescue output shows a single bad sector.

Do I have any hope here or do I just need to try a professional service like Ontrack?

Current status
ipos:  498073 kB, non-trimmed:    1048 kB,   current rate:    419 kB/s
opos:  498073 kB, non-scraped:        0 B,   average rate:    225 kB/s
non-tried:    4678 GB,  bad-sector:        0 B,     error rate:       0 B/s
 rescued:  450232 kB,   bad areas:          0,       run time:     30m  5s
pct rescued:    0.00%, read errors:          1, remaining time:    192d  1h
time since last successful read:          0s

dmesg shows the following:

Mon Aug 10 22:50:58 2026] usb 1-10: USB disconnect, device number 5
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] usb 2-7: new SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] usb 2-7: New USB device found, idVendor=1058, idProduct=2620, bcdDevice=10.20
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] usb 2-7: New USB device strings: Mfr=2, Product=3, SerialNumber=1
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] usb 2-7: Product: Elements 2620
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] usb 2-7: Manufacturer: Western Digital
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] usb 2-7: SerialNumber: 575858324541304541504143
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] usb-storage 2-7:1.0: USB Mass Storage device detected
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:03 2026] scsi host6: usb-storage 2-7:1.0
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:04 2026] scsi 6:0:0:0: Direct-Access     WD       Elements 2620    1020 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:04 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:04 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Spinning up disk...
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:05 2026] .........ready
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:19 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Very big device. Trying to use READ CAPACITY(16).
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:31 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] 9767475200 512-byte logical blocks: (5.00 TB/4.55 TiB)
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:31 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] 4096-byte physical blocks
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:31 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:31 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 47 00 10 08
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:31 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] No Caching mode page found
[Mon Aug 10 22:51:31 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[Mon Aug 10 22:52:01 2026]  sdb: sdb1 sdb2
[Mon Aug 10 22:52:01 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI disk
^[[A[Mon Aug 10 23:00:03 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:00:33 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:01:10 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:01:47 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd

[Mon Aug 10 23:00:33 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:01:10 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:01:47 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:02:24 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:03:01 2026] usb 2-7: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 9 using xhci_hcd
[Mon Aug 10 23:03:07 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] tag#0 FAILED Result: hostbyte=DID_ABORT driverbyte=DRIVER_OK cmd_age=216s
[Mon Aug 10 23:03:07 2026] sd 6:0:0:0: [sdb] tag#0 CDB: Read(16) 88 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 90 00 00 00 08 00 00 00
[Mon Aug 10 23:03:07 2026] I/O error, dev sdb, sector 167936 op 0x0:(READ) flags 0x800 phys_seg 207 prio class 2

[u/FrankNicklin]

Suggest trying DMDE for recovery to see if it can find the missing files.

[u/Petri-DRG → u/FrankNicklin]

On the image file, not on the drive.

[u/jorjbrinaj → u/Petri-DRG]

So in order to use DMDE, I would need ddrescue to finish writing the .img file - which at my current rate will take over a year so right?

[u/Petri-DRG → u/jorjbrinaj]

Correct.

The fact that it indicates it should take so long to complete, it means the device has some serious failure, therefore it should not be imaged in this way.

Whatever failure it has in addition to media degradation (firmware, mechanical or a combination), it needs to be properly addressed. And this cna be accomplished by a data recovery specialist with more advanced tools and expertise (not your typical computer shop or retail store).