XP won't open a USB drive previously used with Vista

[chewyone]

Hi,

am in a bit of trouble here...

I wiped and installed XPSP2 Professional on a machine that was previously running Vista Home Premium as the machine was crawling. The guy who owns it copied all his files onto an external USB drive before I did the install.

Now the USB drive installs okay on XP, but it won't open. It won't open on another Vista machine either. Apparently Vista by default encrypts all data going to an external drive... I did not know this and this guy has about 50GB of stuff on the drive.

There has to be, must be a work around somewhere....?!?

 

[SimonDavies]

Vista by default does NOT encryp all data going to an external drive, I know because I do it all the time.

What exactly is the error message you're getting?

Simon

The real world is not about exam scores, it's about ability.

 

[chewyone]

I don't get an error message. I plug the drive in, XP installed it okay, and the Autoplay window pops up momentarily, but nothing shows.

In My Computer it has been given a drive name but you can't see the drive size and when I double-click on the drive, I get a pop up that says 'Disk is not formatted - The disk in drive X is not formatted. Do you want to format now?'

 

[chewyone]

I plugged it straight in the the MB (SATA) and no difference. Any suggestions??

 

[linney]

Is the drive seen via Disk Management in the Computer Management? Does it give you some ideas about the Status of the drive?

Are you able to access the Security Tab when you right-click on the drive icon?

HOW TO: Take Ownership of a File or Folder in Windows XP (Q308421)

http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q308/4/21.asp

Error Message: "Access Is Denied" When You Try to Open NTFS File System Folders

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q823306#appliesto

Can you run ChkDsk on the drive in any form or fashion from the Recovery Console? While in the Recovery Console have a look at the FixMbr command too.

How to install and use the Recovery Console in Windows XP

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;307654&FR=1&PA=1&SD=HSCH

Is the drive seen in the Bios, is USB options enabled in the Bios?


307070 - Windows XP Does Not Recognize a Q. USB Hard Drive

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;307070&FR=1&PA=1&SD=HSCH

Any clues in the Event Viewer or Device Manager?
314464 - How to Troubleshoot Unknown Devices Listed in Device Manager

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;314464&FR=1&PA=1&SD=HSCH

Is there a problem with mapped drives and drive letters conflicting?

Getting USB Devices to work under Windows XP

http://www.novell.com/coolsolutions/tip/14875.html

Data recovery.
PC Inspector

http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/UK/welcome.htm

http://www.restorer2000.com

http://www.runtime.org/hints.htm

Plenty of other recovery software listed here.

http://dmoz.org/Computers/Software/Disk_Management/Error_Checking_and_Repair/

 

[chewyone]

Thanks Linney, I'll try a couple of those tomorrow, 9pm so off home!