Slave Drive Won't Display in Windows Explorer

[Guest]

I installed a Conner Technologies 10GB hard Drive as a slave drive in my new
Compaq Presario computer running Windows XP Home, set the jumpers to slave
but it doesn't show up in My Computer. The Bios sees it and Device manager
sees it and says it's working properly, (I've uninstalled and reinstalled it)
but I can't get it to
display so I can't access it. It worked fine in my old computer also running
Windows XP Home. Since the Bios sees it, I'm guessing that Windows is the
culprit. Anyone encounter this problem before or have any suggestions?

 

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

Of course not. No version of Windows can 'see' a drive that isn't
partitioned and formatted.

Right click on My Computer and select Manage. On the following screen,
click on Disk Management. You'll now see it on the right hand side of the
screen from where you can partition it, format it and assign it a drive
letter.

 

[Guest]

Thank you for your reply, Cari; but the drive is already formatted and
contains data that I need. If I repartition it and reformat it, won't I lose
all my data?

 

[Seahawk60B]

You shouldn't need to partition it or format it if that has already
been done, but you'll still need to go into disk management and verify
that the disk is activated, online, and has a drive letter assigned.

 

[Guest]

Disk Manager shows it as Basic NTFS file system, healthy (active) but with no
drive letter assigned and the only options availoable when you right click it
is Delete Partition and Help. The Add or Change Drive letter is grayed out.
I've tried making it the master drive since my new computer has a SATA drive;
but that didn't work any better than setting the jumpers to Slave or CS.

 

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

Was it working correctly before you added the new SATA drive? Is it one or
more than one partition? If more than one, were they created with a third
party application?

You might want to try File Scavenger... http://www.quetek.com/prod02.htm

It a very useful utility for getting files and folders from drives which
refuse to have a drive letter (or letters) assigned to them because the
partitions have become screwed. I know it's $49... but it's better than
losing all your files.

 

[RollinTech]

If the old drive had Norton GoBack installed on it when it was the
primary drive in a computer, you'll never get XP to see it until you
disable GoBack.

To do this, temporarily hook up the old drive as the primary bootable
drive in the computer. When you get the GoBack splash screen, press
the space bar, and you'll get an option to disable GoBack. do it.

Now, let the machine finish booting (you may have to boot into safe
mode), then shut it down.

Now, reinstall the new HD as the primary and the old one as the slave.
XP should identify it correctly.

The problem is that GoBack modifies the MBR...

Thx,

 

[RollinTech]

If the old drive had Norton GoBack installed on it when it was the
primary drive in a computer, you'll never get XP to see it until you
disable GoBack.

To do this, temporarily hook up the old drive as the primary bootable
drive in the computer. When you get the GoBack splash screen, press
the space bar, and you'll get an option to disable GoBack. do it.

Now, let the machine finish booting (you may have to boot into safe
mode), then shut it down.

Now, reinstall the new HD as the primary and the old one as the slave.
XP should identify it correctly.

The problem is that GoBack modifies the MBR...

Thx,

 

[Guest]

Cari, you are a guardian angel. File Scavenger is a great program. Rather
than try to recover files from the backup drive that wouldn't display, I was
able to go directly to the main drive in my old computer that crashed and was
no longer accessible. I recovered every file I needed. Thank you, thank
you, thank you. If you were here I'd kiss you.