WD MyBook 250 Gb external HD

[Andy G]

Is this or is this not supported in Vista? Anyone know? It worked fine in
XP, and it shows up in Device Manager, but I can't get a drive letter!!

Thanks in advance

Andy

 

[Wandering]

Is this or is this not supported in Vista? Anyone know? It worked fine
in XP, and it shows up in Device Manager, but I can't get a drive letter!!

Thanks in advance

Andy

Mine worked fine on Win98, XP, and is working daily for a year or more in
Vista. Try right clicking "computer" and selecting "manage" and then Disk
Management. You should be able to see the drive by name, and by right
clicking it assign a letter to it. Please note, it won't likely be the same
letter the other systems applied to it. It will probably be around K L M or
so.

If Vista doesn't see it, boot again into your bios setup, and make sure the
bios sees it. It is probably there alright, and working fine but has no
drive letter, if Device Manager can see it. Assign the letter in Disk
Manager.

Good luck.

 

[Andy G]

Yeah, I tried to do all that and, to recap, it shows up in
Device Manager, which lists it as working properly. However, there is no
sign of it in Explorer or in Computer. When I look in Admin Tools under
Disk Management, it is shown as Disk 1, but with no drive letter. If I
select it and right click and choose "Change Drive Letter and Paths", I get
an error message saying:

"The operation failed to complete because the Disk Management console view
is not up to date. Refresh the view using the Refresh Task. If the problem
persists close the Disk Management console, then restart Disk Management, or
restart the computer."

As you will guess, neither refreshing nor restarting makes any difference.
What on earth do I do to perform this apparently simple operation?

Andy

 

[Timothy Davis [MSFT]]

WD drives are supported on Vista - they all use the inbox class driver for
drive access (there is a HID button driver for some of their models which
you don't necessarily have to install - but can. It is located on WDs
website).

Can you use diskpart to mount the drive and assign a drive letter?

I have had a similar experience with a drive that was dying. Does the drive
still work on other systems?

 

[Wandering]

Mine worked fine on Win98, XP, and is working daily for a year or more in
Vista. Try right clicking "computer" and selecting "manage" and then Disk
Management. You should be able to see the drive by name, and by right
clicking it assign a letter to it. Please note, it won't likely be the
same letter the other systems applied to it. It will probably be around K
L M or so.

If Vista doesn't see it, boot again into your bios setup, and make sure
the bios sees it. It is probably there alright, and working fine but has
no drive letter, if Device Manager can see it. Assign the letter in Disk
Manager.

Good luck.

Well, you do have a problem. Sometimes you can unplug the drive. Go to
Device Manager, and remove the driver, if it's there. Reboot, and then plug
the drive in and let Vista search for it. I did not install any external
drivers for this when I moved it to Vista. The drivers in Vista were
adequate. Some of the advanced models, mine is basic, have backup software
with them, and will need the HID driver the other poster referred to
activate the one-touch backup. One can hope!

 

[Andy G]

Tried the suggestion of removing the driver, rebooting, and then plugging
the WD drive back in. It tried to install a driver, but said that having
found one, it could not install as "an interactive window station is
required for this operation". I have no idea what that is about, but I get
the same message when I try to load a driver for a USB flash drive I'm
trying to use.

This all seemed a retrograde step, so I rolled back using system restore.

Don't think I'm not grateful though, ;-)

Any other thoughts?

Andy

 

[Wandering]

Tried the suggestion of removing the driver, rebooting, and then plugging
the WD drive back in. It tried to install a driver, but said that having
found one, it could not install as "an interactive window station is
required for this operation". I have no idea what that is about, but I
get the same message when I try to load a driver for a USB flash drive I'm
trying to use.

This all seemed a retrograde step, so I rolled back using system restore.

Don't think I'm not grateful though, ;-)

Any other thoughts?

Andy

Well, now! That's a different story. The problem is not with the WD Drive
at all. The problem is with the USB system. I don't recall the specifics,
but a search of this forum will probably get you a bunch of posts on USB and
deleting a particular INF file and letting the system rebuild it. Also there
was at least one KB update that killed a lot of USB ports, and needed
removal.

Again, I don't have the specifics, but a new post describing your problems
with USB ports may get some of the heavy hitters here on the right track for
you. Rolling back was okay. You do what works for you. I don't have any
direct experience with this issue, so I probably can't help you any more.
Again, good luck.

 

[Andy G]

Well, I've had some other USB problems, so your idea certainly feels right.
I'm going to set up the old XP laptop to double check the drive still works
on that, then I shall take the route you suggest.

Many thanks for the steer.

Andy