External harddisk don't show up complete

[Sje]

Hi, I've got a WD 500Gb external USB-hd. It worked fine for a year or so on
my WinXPpro (SP3) machine. The HD works fine on a WINvista notebook. But
since a few days it won't show up in the explorer. In diskmanager it shows
up, but it looks like there's no data on it, it says it works fine.
When using "save remove" the HD shows up, but when I click on it, it shows
up gray. I've removed it in the hardware and then it will install, but first
it says that it is a HD WD 500Gb, but then it starts to install a general HD,
but none of them really goes well. Explorer will hang when trying to connect
to it. In DOS-mode I'm able to do a chkdsk (I did one), but not able to go to
it.
What can be wrong?

 

[smlunatick]

Hi, I've got a WD 500Gb external USB-hd. It worked fine for a year or so on
my WinXPpro (SP3) machine. The HD works fine on a WINvista notebook. But
since a few days it won't show up in the explorer. In diskmanager it shows
up, but it looks like there's no data on it, it says it works fine.
When using "save remove" the HD shows up, but when I click on it, it shows
up gray. I've removed it in the hardware and then it will install, but first
it says that it is a HD WD 500Gb, but then it starts to install a generalHD,
but none of them really goes well. Explorer will hang when trying to connect
to it. In DOS-mode I'm able to do a chkdsk (I did one), but not able to go to
it.
What can be wrong?

Windows can be told to not display certain drive letters in Explorer.
If you are using XP locate TweakUI (Powertoys for XP.) Then under My
Computer ---> Drives : make sure the check marks are on all drives (or
drive letter that was / is assigned to the USB drive.)

 

[DL]

Use WD Seatools to test your drive

 

[Sje]

I've used this tool, no problems. I also did a chkdsk /f, (under DOS-box), it
worked fine. The harddisk is allright, I think it's a problem in the windows
registry or so. As I said in my original post: the harddisk workes fine when
connected to another computer.
I think it's quiet strange that when I use "savely remove hardware" the text
of the disk is grey when I select this disk.

 

[Sje]

Thanks, but this is not the problem. Explorer will hang when plugging in the
USB-cable of the harddisk. XP starts "automatic play", but won't succeed.
Disk is visible in hardware management, but is not useable. In the system log
I can find that the disk is not correct, use chkdsk. I've done that, but this
won't help.