You can try in order to get the data off the external drive.. whole lot of processes that you can do to get it to show up again.. last resort you can probably take the drive somewhere and they can retrieve the data off it.. It sucks tho - you backup all that stuff and then the drive jacks up.. I think from now on I'm going to use huge thumb drives due to no moving parts.. Hopefully Jimmy will check in - he's a lot better at these type computer malfunctions than I am..
Friendship is like peeing your pants.. Everybody can see it, but only you can feel the warmth..