I have an interesting problem with a WD 1TB SATA drive that will seemingly work fine for about 10 minutes at a time. I've been able to transfer specific folders off the HD for a client (photographer, has 700GB filled on this thing) by using unstoppable copy, waiting for it to stop copying files, unplug it, wait about 5 minutes, plug it back up and resume where it left off. This actually works great but its not going to work for the entire drive. It's not making any unusual noises and it always reads correctly in the BIOS. When the drive stops reading correctly, explorer (windows) will hang until you remove the drive and plug it back in. Any ideas on what this could be and some advice on how I may be able to transfer the entire contents to another drive?

possible sounds to us a weak head and its over heating
working to hard.

try and keep the hard drive cool.

get media tool pro do a forward copy and then reverse copy
works in dos.

check out hirens bootdisks

Agree with craig6928 i have also same problem i am taking image Keep it cool once it's getting Hot showing Bad sectors.

Try disabling "Command Queuing" (NCQ).

Ok, I tried all the suggestions and still a no go. I'm confident its an overheating problem but no amount of cooling seems to work however I haven't tried a peltier. Even in mediatools it will start imaging for a few minutes then constant errors. If I was confident it was a head problem, I'd try to match up a donar and swap it but I've never seen anything quite like this before. I've actually been able to retrieve about 6GB worth of pics for the client by unplugging/plugging every 5 or so minutes and resuming my copy but doing it for the other 600+ gig isn't going to work.

Defnitely a weak head. The reverse image will work if you go slowly, but hey the head might die before you get done. Your call.