Western Digital 1TB Drive recognized as 32MB

Question

this is really strange - I've got this 1TB Western Digital HDD and multiple machines (including an USB3-SATA Bridge) detect this HDD with only 32MB capacity.

I guess the Harddisk is broken and ripe for the trash, but before throwing it away - could this be just a firmware issue?

fdisk:

$  fdisk -l  /dev/sdf

Disk /dev/sdf: 33 MB, 33347072 bytes
14 heads, 55 sectors/track, 84 cylinders, total 65131 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x9a56c5f5

Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdf1            2048       65133       31543   83  Linux

SMART-Data:

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Western Digital Caviar Blue Serial ATA
Device Model:     WDC WD10EALX-759BA1
Serial Number:    WD-WMATR1117345
LU WWN Device Id: 5 0014ee 2b1ca2ad3
Firmware Version: 19.01H19
User Capacity:    33.348.608 bytes [33,3 MB]
Sector Size:      512 bytes logical/physical
Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:   8
ATA Standard is:  Exact ATA specification draft version not indicated
Local Time is:    Tue Jan 21 12:37:47 2014 CET
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 16
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME          FLAGS    VALUE WORST THRESH FAIL RAW_VALUE
 1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate     POSR-K   200   200   051    -    0
 3 Spin_Up_Time            POS--K   173   169   021    -    4350
 4 Start_Stop_Count        -O--CK   100   100   000    -    218
 5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   PO--CK   200   200   140    -    0
 7 Seek_Error_Rate         -OSR-K   100   253   000    -    0
 9 Power_On_Hours          -O--CK   098   098   000    -    2189
10 Spin_Retry_Count        -O--CK   100   100   000    -    0
11 Calibration_Retry_Count -O--CK   100   100   000    -    0
12 Power_Cycle_Count       -O--CK   100   100   000    -    216
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count -O--CK   200   200   000    -    40
193 Load_Cycle_Count        -O--CK   200   200   000    -    177
194 Temperature_Celsius     -O---K   124   101   000    -    23
196 Reallocated_Event_Count -O--CK   200   200   000    -    0
197 Current_Pending_Sector  -O--CK   200   200   000    -    0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   ----CK   200   200   000    -    0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count    -O--CK   200   078   000    -    4380
200 Multi_Zone_Error_Rate   ---R--   200   200   000    -    0
240 Head_Flying_Hours       -O--CK   098   098   000    -    2087
241 Total_LBAs_Written      -O--CK   200   200   000    -    2305418223
242 Total_LBAs_Read         -O--CK   200   200   000    -    2680987519
                            ||||||_ K auto-keep
                            |||||__ C event count
                            ||||___ R error rate
                            |||____ S speed/performance
                            ||_____ O updated online
                            |______ P prefailure warning

Any Ideas?

Answer 1

The drive just needs its capacity reset. You can use whatever tool you like to do it.

Most likely, the drive was part of a RAID array and the controller protected the area it was using.