How do you erase an external hard drive which will not show up on your computer?

I bought a LaCie porsche design 2TB external hard drive from the Apple Store to use with time machine on my MAC 2 months ago. It will no longer show up on my desktopn. After speaking with LaCie, they sent me a replacement. However, I have to send the brooken one back to them and since we could not erase it or anything on my Mac is there anyway to erase the hard drive before sending it back to them with all my information on there?
Message was edited by: carolsh

I know. But after Yahoo, Target , Neimans and others. But I agree. They even sent me a more expensive replacement as they did not have my model in stock and is backordered. So, a win win situation. I was impressed that the tech person spent about an hour on the phone with me trying a variety of options. At first, they were going to charge me shipping- but then she changed her mind and shipped the replacement 1 day fed ex. I guess that is why I always buy LaCie vs others. My older LaCie which I still had but was smaller- I plugged in and did a back-up and I had just enough room on it so I have that for safe keepings now as well.
Thanks again for your pleasant response. I guess I need to limit my profile to "registered members" only. I hope Apple monitors these discussions and people's responses periodically.

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How do you erase an external hard drive which will not show up on your computer?

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