DSF

A couple of months ago I purchased 4 x 128Gig USB memory sticks. One of these memory sticks was left connected to my computer storing an automatic backup of my personal information and files - Microsoft Outlook data files etc. This data is very important to me and was backed up 4 times each day.

Last week, I discovered the USB memory stick wasn't being 'seen' by the PC. Unplugged it many times and maybe one occasion it would register and I could see my files but it was unreliable for data backup. I also checked the stick on a few computers, in the main, it just didn't work and wasn't 'seen' by the computer - just the very odd occasion it worked but would disappear again.

Clearly the unit was defective - the other 3 work perfectly well.

So I contact Ebuyer and explain the situation informing them the USB memory contains some personal details. Ebuyer insisted I had to send it back to them! Obviously I can't do this and offered to break the thing up so it can't possibly be read and return the bits. They didn't accept this, insisting it had to be returned.

I'm left wondering if there's anything I can do as I obviously can't return it.

I've spent a lot of money with Ebuyer and did expect them to find someway of dealing with this. I won't be buying anything else from them.

Interested in any comments.

John

Have you tried recovery software on the stick? I've done this a few times on flash drives/cards quite successfully. Do you 'eject' the sticks by right clicking Mac style? This can help stop corruption but shouldn't really be necessary on a PC.

I swear by backing up to a second internal drive, external drive and also secure cloud storage, the latter being the best and safest by far. I do feel USB can be a fickle connection at times.

eBuyer always have been great when you're buying and not quite so great when you're RMA'ing!

Not sure where you stand with the personal data being on it, I guess it's the same as when you send an internal drive back for exchange, you can pretty much always recover something off it if you try hard enough.

Put it in the microwave for a while then they can have it

Obviously nothing can be done about the yes/no data recovery question so I am wondering is this a Sandisc (or similar) £40 odd stick or a cheaper one? Either way it seems you're 'snookered' unless you're willing to send it back which you appear not to be so it's probably 'take the hit' and buy one off fleabay for not a lot of £'s.

So if the stick was only for a backup, you presumably still have copies of the original files? Why not back them all up again onto one of the working sticks, then when you do get the dodgy stick to work on occasion, wipe the data from it, and send it back to them blank? I'm assuming they want it back so they can test it, and then send a replacement/refund?

Just on the off-chance you haven't already tried it - I have a couple of sticks like this and they often work much better if I plug into a rear port rather than a front/top port.

It might get you nowhere but worth a try.

For some strange reason I'm unable to 'type' a reply from Windows 10 Edge browser!! I'm now using Chrome.

Thanks for all the replies guys and all comments.

Sometimes the stick does show and I started to do a 'wipe' to securely erase any data but, the stick disappeared half way through. I've tried the stick on various PCs with the same inconsistent results. More often than not, the stick simply doesn't exist when plugged in.

So, having erased my data it's being returned to eBuyer for a replacement.