Can't See My External Drive - PLEASE HELP!

[anxieteze]

I have a Maxtor external drive that works perfect when plugged into my Airport Wireless box...i can see it with both my Mac and PC...when i check it, it says it is a Fat32 in the Explorer. When i plug it into my computer directly, it tells me its loaded, makes the noise, but i can't find it in My Computer. I am running Win Vista Premium on a Compaq Laptop and I need to move a large music collection and need to plug it direct for speed! Any ideas????

 

[Fastboy42]

have you got alot of removable devices in my computer?
try safely removing all of them then plug your harddrive in

 

[ShArKy]

what operating systems are running on the machines that it WORKS on?

 

[anxieteze]

I can ONLY access it through the network, when i plug it directly into my PC it seems to recognize it, but i cannot see it in My Computer. I am running Vista Premium.

 

[AstaLaVista]

Let me guess, you are plugging it through one of the front USB ports, right? if so, try plugging it from one of the back USB ports, from one of the ones that comes from the mobo and not as an attachment.

I have a 320GB WD passport and I had the same problem with my Vista x64 PC, which as of yet, have not been able to understand why it does it because my XP PC has no issues whatsoever with it no matter what USB port I use... Vista is awesome but very finickee (sp?) and temperamental... sometimes, I hate it because of it.

Fastboy42 is right, perhaps you have to many removable devices and there is a conflict of IRQ's, for testing purposes,try removing some of the one not use much by uninstalling them from the DEvice Manager and see what happens. If that fails, try my first tip.

Good Luck

 

[anxieteze]

Thanks for your responses....i have 3 USB ports and am only using one with a bluetooth mouse device - the ONLY other thing to show up as connected is the Network deveice - will try to plug the drive into a different USB and give it a shot!

 

[anxieteze]

I can see it in my computer disk manager, but not through my explorer (:

 

[anxieteze]

I just rebooted and it found device drivers and installed them (TAP VPN Adaptor) and still can't see it....any other ideas?

 

[AstaLaVista]

What kind of an external drive is it? MOdel & Brand.

Can you post a pic of explorer where it shows all the folders, etc, etc.

 

[anxieteze]

its a Maxtor OneTouch 4 500GB...in Disk Management there is no letter assigned, just says size and healthy. Not sure how to upload pics. What pain this is.

 

[whs]

It probably has no drive letter. Go to Disk Management (diskmgmt.msc in Run), right click on it and assign a drive letter.