Enclosure Disassembly

Finding Your Hard Drive’s Model Number

Why We Need Your Drive’s Model Number

To provide an accurate “Recovery Chances” estimate, we need the exact model number from the internal hard drive—not just the external enclosure model. This number is found on the label of the drive itself, hidden inside the enclosure.

Below, you’ll find step-by-step videos showing how to safely remove your external enclosure to access the hard drive inside.

Once you remove the hard drive from the enclosure, you can identify the model number.

Click the brand of your external drive to find a disassembly video:

Seagate

Seagate 2TB Desktop “Expansion” Drive


How to disassemble a 2TB Seagate External Hard Drive

Seagate 1TB Desktop “Free Agent” Drive


How to open a Seagate FreeAgent Desk external hard drive enclosure

Seagate 3TB desktop “GoFlex” Drive


Seagate GoFlex Desk 3.5" hard drive (2TB, 3TB, etc.) tear-down disassembly removal from enclosure.

Seagate 4TB Desktop “Backup Plus” Drive


How to open a Seagate Backup Plus Drive

Seagate 1TB Portable “Expansion” Drive


How to open Seagate Expansion Portable Hard Drive

Seagate One Touch Hub Drive
(this video is not in English, but you’ll only need to “see” the video to understand how to disassemble the enclosure)


Ext. HDD Disassembling (One Touch Hub)

Western Digital

Western Digital 1TB Desktop “Elements” Drive


How to Open a Western Digital Elements External Hard Drive Enclosure

Western Digital 1TB desktop “MyBook” drive


Disassembling 750GB Western Digital My Passport

Western Digital 1TB desktop “MyBook” drive


Opening a WD My Book External HDD Case Guide

Western Digital 1TB desktop “MyCloud” drive


How to open a WD My Cloud Case

Western Digital 3TB desktop “MyBook Essential” drive


How To Disassemble a Western Digital My Book Essential External Hard Drive

Western Digital 4TB desktop RAID “MyBook Studio Edition II”


WD My Book Studio Edition II 4TB - Hard Disk Replacement

Western Digital 2TB portable “MyPassport” drive


How to dismantle a Western Digital My Passport external USB 3.0 hard drive

Western Digital 2TB portable “MyPassport Ultra” USB 3 (thick)


My Passport 2TB External USB 3 0 Portable Hard Drive Disassemble

Western Digital 2TB portable “My Passport” drive (thin)


WD My Passport 2TB Hard Drive Disassembly - What's Inside?

Lacie

Lacie 1TB desktop “Porsche” drive


How to open HDD Casing LaCie Porsche Design P'9233 USB 3.0 2TB External Hard Drive THE WRONG WAY.

Lacie 1TB desktop drive


LaCie disassembly 1Tb HDD (hsusb 2.0)

Toshiba

Toshiba portable “Canvio” drive


HOW TO OPEN TOSHIBA USB HDD EXETERNAL CANVIO READY DTP220 2TB

Samsung

Samsung 500GB portable drive


How to Open a External Hard Disc Samsung - 500 GB

Verbatim

Verbatim 2.5″ Enclosure Model: AC500GBR


Verbatim 2.5" Enclosure Model: AC500GBR How to Open

Verbatim External Hard Drive Disassembly


Verbatim External Hard Drive Disassembly

 

Can’t find a video showing your exact model external drive?

Try one of these options:

– Look for a similar drive from the same manufacturer and size category (portable or desktop)

– Search YouTube using terms like “disassembly” + your drive model

– Email us photos of your enclosure at and we’ll help identify the correct disassembly method

Questions?

Check our FAQ, chat, or email.

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