USB External Drive - shouldn't I "see" the drive???

  • Thread starter Thread starter H
  • Start date Start date
H

H

Installed a new DYNEX External CD-RW drive on a P-III Win
XP Pro machine this eve. USB 2.0 all around. Plugged
in, things started happening, XP says it recognized the
new hardware and gave every indication that it was set to
go. When I opened up Win Explorer I expected to see it
as Drive G but it's not listed! Either it's not
installed totally or I misunderstand how these USB Mass
Storage devices are to be addressed. I think it's
totally installed because I wasn't prompted to insert any
software driver disks. The drive doc states that XP
should recognize the drive and install drivers for it
without help.

Shouldn't I see the drive listed somewhere in the tree on
the left hand side of Win Explorer??? If not, how do you
address this thing?

Hope someone can clue me in as the results aren't what I
expected (of course).

Thanks.
 
Did you check for it in device manager? What does it say about the drive?

--

Regards:

Richard Urban



aka Crusty (-: Old B@stard :-)
 
Going to answer my own question - how silly is that?

It seems that Win Explorer won't see the drive (I don't
know why) but Nero Burning Rom 6.0 sees it - as Drive G
which is what I thought.

So apparently you need at least some "interpreting"
software between the USB device and Win XP in order for
it to work. I had thought it would just be a "native"
feature of XP but I was wrong. Right? Anyone care to
pitch in as to why Explorer won't id and display the USB
drive/device?

H.
 
Yes, Richard I did. Dev Mgr definitely shows the drive is
home, along with the other two optical drives. Explorer
isn't showing it - which I find strange. I just test
wrote some files (using Nero) and the drive with that
software performed flawlessly. Again, I just find it
strange that Win Expl fails to display this resource.
Don't you?

Thanks for the quick resp. Dynex's 24/7 Customer Support
is dead! Guess the drives are too cheap ($70!) to
warrant what's promised in the user guide.

H
 
-----Original Message-----
Did you check for it in device manager? What does it say about the drive?
Click to expand...

I'll repost my response. I did and DEv Mgr shows it's
definitely there. Here's some more as I've just been
playing with it. If you have Win Expl up on the screen,
unplug the Ext CD RW for a moment and then plug it back
in (hot swapping is allowed), the thing does show up in
the left hand pane as drive G (what I expect), but only
for about 5 seconds! It then disappears on it's own.
Where it goes to - God only knows. Same result if you
power it off and power it on.

Wow! This is really goofy! I did write some test MP3s
and some video to it in Nero. Works great, I just won't
be able to use it in Windows Explorer until I figure out
what causes it to disappear like this.

A real stumper...

H
 
Then format the drive through disk management!

--

Regards:

Richard Urban



aka Crusty (-: Old B@stard :-)
 
Have you tried "map external drive?"


--
The people think the Constitution protects their rights;
But government sees it as an obstacle to be overcome.


in message | Then format the drive through disk management!
|
| --
|
| Regards:
|
| Richard Urban
|
|
|
| aka Crusty (-: Old B@stard :-)
|
|
| | >
| > Yes, Richard I did. Dev Mgr definitely shows the drive
is
| > home, along with the other two optical drives. Explorer
| > isn't showing it - which I find strange. I just test
| > wrote some files (using Nero) and the drive with that
| > software performed flawlessly. Again, I just find it
| > strange that Win Expl fails to display this resource.
| > Don't you?
| >
| > Thanks for the quick resp. Dynex's 24/7 Customer
Support
| > is dead! Guess the drives are too cheap ($70!) to
| > warrant what's promised in the user guide.
| >
| > H
| >
|
|
 
-----Original Message-----
Then format the drive through disk management!

--
Click to expand...

I feel pretty stupid right now. You gave me the tipoff
though. The drive now shows up (permanently, more or
less) in Exploder //-IF-// you have a formatted disk
mounted! I doesn't act like a standard internal optical
drive meaning that it is present all the time.

Who'd have known?

H
 
Have you tried formatting and/or partitioning the drive
using the disk management tools? If there are no defined
partitions on the drive XP will not allocate drive
letters. I would assume that Nero is seeing it as a
writable volume not as a valid drive.
 
Ignore me, I just re-read your post. I missed the fact
that you said it was an external CD-RW!!!!
 
Back
Top