External HDD Help?

[Jaz]

Probably a newbie question knowing me, but I'm stuck.

I recently bought a 3.5 External HDD Case so I could use my old HDD from my old computer on my new PC as external memory via USB. I've put the HDD into the case, and it powers up alright and XP recognises the device with the "USB device activated sound", but then nothing happens and the device is not visible from My Computer.

Then after about a minute, XP plays the "USB device disconnected sound".



The HDD in the case has come straight out of my old PC, should I of formatted it first? Is this why XP won't recognise it as external memory? Or should it recognise it anyway?

Cheers in advance, you geeks.

[Falcon4ever]

How about pluggin in the external power adapter... 3.5 hdd cases can't live without them. only 2.5 can

[Blacklord]

Just like diffrent partitions man. There should be a maxtor sofware which can help.
Simplified for complete geeks(like u nah just kidding)--->When u slip ur hardisk in 2 pieces the comp only sees the 1 piece. To see the 2 piece u need a special dos progam. Don't ask me where to get it couse i'll be dammed if i know XD.

[zAlbee]

Blacklord -- wtf? that made no sense.

[Jaz]

How about pluggin in the external power adapter... 3.5 hdd cases can't live without them. only 2.5 can

I'm not that much of a noobie!

[Slougi]

Do you have another hard drive to test with?

[Niggy G]

I get problems with external devices if the drive mapping is already used. i.e my PSP is connected then i try to connect my external hard drive that also wants to be d:

But your problem sounds different. Have you changed the pins on the back of your drive?

[Jaz]

But your problem sounds different. Have you changed the pins on the back of your drive?

Now you've lost me.

Am I going to have to take photos?

[Niggy G]

There should be a little plastic jumper that fits onto two pins on the back of the hard disk. When I started using my external hard disk I had to change the jumper settings to 'Master' (the instructions for which setting is master should be on the top of the hard disk). Try changing this...

but im still not confident this is the problem either.

[blizz]

I just shoved an old HD in an Icy Box last night. You'll need to change the pins setting from slave/cable select to master. (Normally there's a sticker on top of the hd showing the pin configuration to get set the HD up as master).