3.5" External Hard Drive Case 5

[skildner]

I just bought new a 120gig Maxtor hard drive and an Argosy external hard drive case (connect IDE hard drive to USB port). Everything seemed to go fine. Win XP automatically recognized the USB device as the instructions said it would. The problem is that it doesn't show up anywhere. There is no new drive listed. I tried restarting the computer and the drive in many combinations, but I got the same result. I also tried changing the jumper settings on the hard drive. How can I gain access to the drive? Thanx.

 

[kestrel1]

I would think that you would require a driver for the external USB case. I am really sure because I have never tried one. Have a lookk on the manufacturers web site.

 

[edfair]

Doesn't it require fdisk to partition it, and format to make it ready?

Ed Fair
Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply. Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[Peahippo]

Let's address the driver issue first. These pages waffle on the driver issue:

http://www.addonics.com/products/external_hdd/aemed35_r.asp

http://www.addonics.com/products/external_hdd/aesexdu2.asp

... but this page says Win98se users need the driver, but the NT-class OSes (NT, 2K, XP) don't:

http://support.wdc.com/download/

... hence I conclude that XP understands USB hard drives.

Past that point, IDE drives hanging off the USB probably act just like normal IDE drives, meaning they must be partitioned and formatted to be used in the Windows OSes. Skildner, Ed's right, you have to use

fdisk

to partition your new drive, and then

format

.

 

[laker7465]

You should be able to format the drive right from Admin Tools-Computer Management-Disk Management module - check there first to see if the drive is shown. If it is you need to format and assign a drive letter.

If it's not shown there then you might have a (pretty old) BIOS, or USB problem.

 

[invitro2]

skildner, Did you solve the problem? I have the same problem. I formated the hard disk before install it.

 

[invitro2]

I found the solution.
IN window 2000, goto control panel, and under 'Disk Managment', check the disk, The external disk may be disabled. so just activate it. That is all.