External Hard Drive

[Bill Johnson]

I have a Western Gigital Hard Drive in an external case
for connection with a USB port. My Device Manager
recognizes it as a mass storage device and is wotking properly. It says it
is in USB port 0.
How can I establish an address so I can use it? When I use windows explorer
it just shows usb port.
What am I missing here?
Thanks
Bill Johnson

 

[Richard Urban [MVP]]

You have to partition and format the external drive.

--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from: George Ankner
"If you knew as much as you thought you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!"

 

[Bill Johnson]

Finally figured out how to format the drive. All is well now thanks for all
the help.

 

[Guest]

I apologize for posting this as a reply, but the system won't let me generate
a new question.

I am trying to restore a backup file from an external hard drive, but
Windows XP doesn't recognize the drive. Here are the facts. About a week ago,
the hard drive on my notebook died. I took it to the shop and got it
replaced. I've now reinstalled XP and added all of the service packs and
releases available. My external hard drive is a Maxtor 3000LE (B) USB 2.0
device.

Earlier in the week, I did the same thing and was able to access the
external drive. I screwed up restoring the backup (I included Windows files)
and so I had to reformat the C drive on the notebook and reinstall XP. This
time, after performing all of the updates, it doesn't show the external drive.

If I go into device manager, I can see it under "disk drives." If I go into
Administrative Tools | Computer Management, I can see it there also. In this
case, however, it shows its status as "Basic 114.49 GB Online" and "114.49 GB
Unallocated."

The external drive was fully functional the last time I accessed it, a
couple of days ago.

Any thoughts?

 

[Ron Sommer]

You may need to take ownership of the drive.
http://rickrogers.org/fixes.htm#Taking_ownership

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the tip, but that doesn't apply here. I can't "see" the drive in
My Computer. From research I have done, this problem is not uncommon and
appears to result from having the USB drive plugged in while reformatting the
C drive and then reinstalling Windows XP on it. I gather it has to do with a
bad drive signature.

The workaround I'm trying right now involves using GetDataBack for NTFS to
"recover" all of the data on the external drive and store it on a new
external. This is pretty kludgy and I'm sure there has to be a better way.
Anyway, for now I'm hoping this will work.

 

[Edward W. Thompson]

I apologize for posting this as a reply, but the system won't let me
generate
a new question.

I am trying to restore a backup file from an external hard drive, but
Windows XP doesn't recognize the drive. Here are the facts. About a week
ago,
the hard drive on my notebook died. I took it to the shop and got it
replaced. I've now reinstalled XP and added all of the service packs and
releases available. My external hard drive is a Maxtor 3000LE (B) USB 2.0
device.

Earlier in the week, I did the same thing and was able to access the
external drive. I screwed up restoring the backup (I included Windows
files)
and so I had to reformat the C drive on the notebook and reinstall XP.
This
time, after performing all of the updates, it doesn't show the external
drive.

If I go into device manager, I can see it under "disk drives." If I go
into
Administrative Tools | Computer Management, I can see it there also. In
this
case, however, it shows its status as "Basic 114.49 GB Online" and "114.49
GB
Unallocated."

The external drive was fully functional the last time I accessed it, a
couple of days ago.

Any thoughts?

If you can see the drive in 'Computer Management' WINXP is 'seeing' the
drive but I suspect it does not have a drive letter allocated. Allocate a
drive letter to the drive in Computer Management and all should be well.

 

[Guest]

If only I could do that, I'd be delighted. That option is not available when
I right mouse click. It is available on the boot and CD drives, but not this
external. When I first reformatted and re-installed, XP saw the device and
assigned it a drive letter. When I reformatted and reinstalled again, it no
longer assigned a drive letter.

 

[Edward W. Thompson]

If only I could do that, I'd be delighted. That option is not available
when
I right mouse click. It is available on the boot and CD drives, but not
this
external. When I first reformatted and re-installed, XP saw the device and
assigned it a drive letter. When I reformatted and reinstalled again, it
no
longer assigned a drive letter.

I suggest you visit http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic8213.html where there is
a discussion on the problem you have with various approaches that appeared
to have 'fixed' the problem.

If you find a solution you may care to post it as it will likely help
others.

Good luck.