USB Hard Drive

[Completely Lost]

Hello,

I have WinXP Service Pack 2 and all of the other latest updates, patches and
hotfixes.

I have an external USB hard drive attached to the USB port on an Intel
motherboard.

On Start-up the device is NOT detected.

If I then turn off the device then turn power back on it is then detected.

Why is it not being detected on Start-up?

Thank you to anyone who can give helpful information.

The computer gods, ( who happen to be my very good friends, have assured me
that they'll damn you to computer hell. ) will frown upon all other
sarcastic comments.

 

[glamart]

I had that problem before service pack 2 which was supposed to clean
up all of the USB issues. You might check the driver and find out if
it is an Intel driver or the updated Windows XP driver (from SP2).
Also check Intel's website for an updated USB driver. Normally the
new Windows XP driver in SP2 works the best but the Intel mobo may
have some peculiarity requiring the Intel driver.

 

[Malke]

Hello,

I have WinXP Service Pack 2 and all of the other latest updates,
patches and hotfixes.

I have an external USB hard drive attached to the USB port on an Intel
motherboard.

On Start-up the device is NOT detected.

If I then turn off the device then turn power back on it is then
detected.

Why is it not being detected on Start-up?

Is the USB hard drive powered by the computer or by an external power
source (wall outlet)? If it the drive doesn't have an external power
source, try plugging it into a powered USB hub instead.

Malke

 

[Anna]

Hello,

I have WinXP Service Pack 2 and all of the other latest updates, patches
and hotfixes.

I have an external USB hard drive attached to the USB port on an Intel
motherboard.

On Start-up the device is NOT detected.

If I then turn off the device then turn power back on it is then detected.

Why is it not being detected on Start-up?

Thank you to anyone who can give helpful information.

The computer gods, ( who happen to be my very good friends, have assured
me that they'll damn you to computer hell. ) will frown upon all other
sarcastic comments.

Completely Lost:
You're probably not going to like this answer, but here it is anyways...

It happens. We don't know why. But it happens. Time & time again we have
encountered the same situation, i.e., if the USBEHD is connected at bootup,
the system doesn't detect its existence. But when connected AFTER bootup,
there's no problem. And strange to say, we've even run into the opposite
problem -- when the device is connected at bootup the system recognizes it,
but if it's connected after bootup it is not.

And just to confirm, when you connect your USBEHD to the computer, you are
connecting it *directly* into a USB port on the computer, right? You're not
using a USB hub, right? If the latter, connect the device directly into the
computer's USB port. USB hubs can be another problem area.

Do you have one of those USB jump (thumb, flash, memory stick) drives
available? Same problem?

Anyway, to exhaust all potential remedies, contact the manuf. of your USB
enclosure. See if they know anything about your problem, and if so, if
there's a fix.

One other thing. The problem we've encountered along the same lines seems to
be more prevalent when older motherboards are involved, those manuf. more
than about four years ago. In some cases there's a BIOS upgrade available
that has the fix, so check that out.
Anna

 

[Guest]

I used to have that problem also. I figured out that I have to turn on the
external hard drive first, before turning on the computer. Detects it every
time.

 

[Lil' Dave]

Odd. No such problem on a Firewire connected hard drive here. Yes, I
installed SP2. Intel chipset motherboard, SIIG firewire card.

If I had to guess, USB2 was not provided for in pre-SP2 installations. You
had to load the manufaturer's driver for it. In some cases, that may be the
source of the problem.

 

[Completely Lost]

Thank you for all of the responses!

 

[Anna]

And which one, if any, helped solve your problem?