External Hard drive "bug?"

[abaddonsghost]

My external hard drive which ive been using for around 3-4 months has now started acting strange...either that or my computer.
When i plug in my external the safely remove thing never shows up.
I have tried the batch execution thing and it doesnt show up there either.
Its a Western Digital 250gb, and im running XP SP3 if that helps.
Its on optimize for quick removal but that doesnt stop it from writing stuff to the disk,
Example... when i take it out( i wait till the light stops flashing) a error comes up saying "Delayed Disk write" to hard disk 3 or something.
This hard drive has many of my important data that wont fit on my computer so... i cant really format it or anything.
USB flash drives are working correctly its just external hard drives.
Also my external in device manager is considered a disk drive not a removable drive..if that makes any difference

P.S if this post is in the wrong section of forums please dont delete it just move it.

***Update*** 5 hours later and now my flash drives are doing the same thing....So im absolutely stumped

 

[LookinAround]

You might take look through here for some things to try: See [post=720762]Troubleshoot: Windows Won't Recognize Your USB Hard Drive[/post]

In particular I'd start with
> Making sure you run Custom for Windows Updates. Make sure all hardware optional as well as the critical updates are installed
> Run the DriveCleanup Tool
> Try reinstalling USB controllers and motherboard chipset drivers