Resolved External USB HardDrive no longer available or accessible

This is a 1.5TB WD Elements drive that I've had for perhaps 15 years. It contains a lot of videos of movies mostly. I have two computers, and it behaves the same on both of them. When I plug it in,
it now identifies in Windows Explorer as F:/ Local Disk , where it used to be F:/Elements.
When I plug it in, a green progress bar grows slowly to the limit of its travel and i get a popup that is titled Location Is Not Available. It states that F:/is not accessible. The parameter is incorrect.
Thus far, I've run CHKDSK F: /f/r from the command prompt twice. Both times it goes through 3 of the 5 stages and returns to C:/User/New User. The stages are File Verification, Verifying Indexes, and Security Descriptors. It purports to make some repairs at certain Indexes, and mentions a few Movie Titles, so I know that it is accessing the content of the drive.
I then called WD tech support. They had me download and install WD DLGDIAG, and I gave them permission to look at my screen as they walked me through a few steps. The computer becomes very slow and balky while the external drive is connected and access is attempted. I think the WD tech became impatient and sent me an email with contacts to several 3rd party data recovery companies.
After WD tech support disconnected, the software finally became available. I ran the Quick Test and started the Extended Test, but gave up after a while.
The Quick Test ran for 9 seconds and came up with "Quick Test on Drive 3 did not complete"
"Starter code=07(Failed Read Test Element)" "Failure Checkpoint =97(Unknown Test)"
My question: Is there a piece of software, free or otherwise that I can attempt to run on my own in hopes of accessing the drive and copying the movies to a new drive?
There are quite a number of movies, and although I hate to lose them and the effort it took to collect them, I am not prepared to spend the estimated $100-$300 plus labor that it would cost to have some professional outfit do it for me. Thank you.

 

When your drive is shown in Explorer, have you Right clicked on the drive and checked in Properties to see if something has changed?

 

I don't think I ever looked at the drive's properties, so I'm afraid looking for any change is not something I could do.
I just now booted up the computer to which the drive is connected. Right clicking on the drive results in about a 2 minute delay, but, under properties it shows "0 bytes" under used, free, and capacity. So, I suppose that is a change.
I tried error checking under tools, and got a popup that said the drive is inaccessible so the error check could not be performed.
Thanks for your response and interest.

 

Sad to be bearer of bad news but seems your hard disk is gone. Don't try to connect it anymore if you wish your data back & "expensive" data recovery services seem the only choice.
Good luck

 

Do you have another computer you could try it on?

 

Hi Mr Bill. I do have a newer computer that has both USB 2 and 3 on the MB. I did try the drive on both computers. Same result. I did mention that in my initial posting.
Thanks to you and rsinfo for your replies. I'll just abandon this pursuit and mark this thread as solved.
Cheers.

 

I must of missed where you tried it on another computer. Good luck with what ever you do.