The drive does show up in disk utility; however, it is not mounted and cannot be mounted. When attempting to repair the drive, we get this:
Verify and Repair disk “C”
** /dev/disk2s1
** Phase 1 - Read FAT
Unable to read FAT (Input/output error)
Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit
1 non HFS volume checked
1 volume could not be repaired because of an error
I suspect the files may still be on the drive, but the file system has been corrupted because when I plugged the drive into a PC, I discovered the drive is being read "raw file system".
Any suggestions on how I might be able to recover the files? I tried testdisk for mac; however, it cannot find the drive.
BTW, I realize now I really don't need to defrag, and especially an external hard drive that just contained data files and pictures!