External maxtor HDD not recognised - help!!!

P

poundhound

Registered User
Messages
63
Hi, I have a 250g external maxtor hard drive attached to my PC.

When I got the HD originally I backed up tons of stuff, but when I connect it now, the PC doesnt seem to recognise it.

It is showing up in device manager, under USB mass storage device, but there is no drive letter in "my computer" and basically cannot be accessed.

If anyone has a fix, it would be deeply appreciated.
 
Maybe something to do with updates or sp's that were installed since you first used the external, HD.. Worth trying a system restore.
 
Could it be damaged? This happened to me at christmas. You can damage it further if you continually try to access it. Best to have an expert look at it if you suspect this could be the case and they can hopefully recover your data.
 
Try it on another computer and see if it works, maybe bring it into work and try it there.
 
Can you get one of those USB connecting leads that have an additional 'power' connection?

This goes into the USB port, and the data connection goes into another. Means that extra power is fired down the cable to your HDD. Maybe the drive hasn't enough power to get it running.

Like this one:
[broken link removed]

Put your ear to it and see if its making a noise when connected. Does it sound like it spinning inside?

Did you try a different USB Cable?
 
RMCF said:
Can you get one of those USB connecting leads that have an additional 'power' connection?...
Click to expand...

Thats only for 2.5" drives. If hes using a 3.5" external it won't make a difference. Poundhound which is it?

If the drive shows up in device manager, the computer sees it so, a faulty cable is unlikely, but not impossible.

poundhound has the drive been moved since you last used it.
 
the drive letter that was originally assigned to the drive is probably not available anymore.

right click on MyComputer, choose Manage.
go in Disk Management and right click on that drive.
you should be able to Assign a letter to the drive from there.
choose from the available ones.
 
The HDD seems fine. It is being recognised in disk managment but not in my computer. Its listed as "disk 5, basic, online".
The problem seems to be that I cant assign a drive letter to it.
When I right click on the drive in disk managment, the only options I get are "PROPERTIES" and "HELP" but that offers no assistance. There is no option to assign a drive letter.
Im sure this is very easily rectified but I just cant seem to nail it. GGGrrrr!!!
Help
 
Did you try a new cable? If that doesn't work, then perhaps the housing of the HDD is damaged - this happened to me last year, so I got a very nice young man to install it into my desktop as a backup hard drive and bought a new 1TB hard drive which I use for all my movies & TV downloads
 
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