External Hard Drive (WD Elements 2620), having issue with file transfer

External Hard Drive (WD Elements 2620), having issue with file transfer

Hello

I have a 5 TB Western Digital Elements 2620 External, Portable Hard Drive.   I bought it in 2020, and it has about 2 TB of data on it (photos, songs, word files, etc.)   None of the individual files are particularly big, no movie files or anything.   I had an issue last week with it.  Specifically, I had Calibre Portable running, and wasn't able to view any of the files through the app.   I also had issues opening other files on the drive.   I bought a new drive to copy everything over just in case.    In copying the files, the transfer will go through for a while, then hang on a random file.  I say random, but each time I try, it will be the same file.   Epub, Mobi, PDF, JPG.   No rhyme or reason.   The file it hangs on won’t be particularly big (the one I’m looking at right now is 345 KB), the file name won't be particularly long, and other files go through just fine.   Sometimes it will start up again after some time (maybe an hour, maybe more), and then it will give me one of the the following error messages:

1)  “Can’t Read from the Source File or disk”.  No further explanation.   This is the one I get overwhelmingly often.

2) Maybe twice, I've gotten:

An Unexpected error is keeping you from copying the file.  If you continue to receive this error, you can use the error code to search for help with this problem.  Error 0x80070079: The semaphore timeout period has expired.   .   

Steps:

I've restarted my computer.  I originally tried this on my desktop, but have also tried my laptop.   I've tried a different USB port, and a different USB cable.  I've tried copying files to the computer hard drive, and to another external drive.    

I've run CHKDSK on the external drive, and it told me that any errors had been fixed.   

I've run "Hardware and Devices troubleshooter", and after scanning, told me to restart the computer to fix anything.  I dutifully restarted.   

Right now, I am copying files over in smaller chunks and just waiting it out when it hangs.   

What's up here?   What is wrong with my drive and how do I fix it?  Should I just go ahead with moving everything off in small pieces?   It's 2 TB so it will take a while.

Any help would be appreciated.  Thank you.  

Personally, I would keep copying smaller chunks of files until you are done. Start with you most important files first. The  drive may be failing.

If you have another computer do you still get the same file errors while copying.

Once you have completed the copy you can do a short and long test on the drive with the WD dashboard.

https://support-en.wd.com/app/answers/detailweb/a_id/31759/~/download%2C-install%2C-test-drive-and-update-firmware-using-western-digital

That error code is network related according to the below link but you are copying between local disks.

https://www.thewindowsclub.com/error-0x80070079-the-semaphore-timeout-period-has-expired

I'm pulling files off piece by piece, but if it comes to it, are EaseUS or Disk Drill things I should be looking at?  Are they legit or scams?  Thank you.

Those software are for recovering files if the drive cannot me read by File Explorer. For example, if the partition table was missing and the drive labeled as RAW or the file system was severely damaged.

Then do I have any options if the drive fails and I don't get everything off in time?

Hopefully the drive doesn't do a full failure. If it does and you need data off the drive then the only option is a professional data recovery service which is not cheap.

Have there been many files so far that have not copied over?