My External Hard Drive is recognized but won't open

[djcutler]

Hi,

I have an 80GB USB Hard Drive that I connect to my computer to store files but for some reason, just recently, it has stopped showing up in the 'My Computer' folder. It shows up as a device in device manager 'Maxtor S ABRE USB Device' but I don't know how to open it.

How can I open my External Hard Drive to access the files without it popping up in the 'My Computer' window?

 

[Tedster]

go to disk management under control panel and refresh the drive in there.

 

[djcutler]

Is 'Disk Management' the same as 'Device Manager'?

My Hard Drive is showing up at Location 0. Shouldn't it show up as a letter drive (e: drive, for example)?

 

[N3051M]

different. Disk management as the name implies only deals with devices capable of storage (flash drives, HDDS, optical drives etc), whilst device manager manages all types of hardware....

Just type in diskmgmt.msc into the Run box and it will come up.

 

[weird_name_lah]

Thanx to the reply for disk management and I found out how to 'activate' an external disk drive... I don't know whether djcutler still needs this but anyway, there's a chance that your disk (especially when it's brand new), is not yet formatted yet which happens to my brand new 80GB external hard drive.

Go to disk management using the specified method or control panel, then there should be a pop-up coming out other than your disk management window. It is asking you to "initialize" your disk, go ahead and "initialize it". After that, if format option is not available, go and create a partition for your disk. I forgot how, if I'm not wrong just right click to your disk identified in Disk Management as Disk1 or whatever and you should be able to work your way through like what I did... For my case, it's only after this that the disk is detected in My Computer (along the process you'll get to choose a drive letter for your disk)... And for my case again, it is only after this that I can format and use the disk afterwards...

I am not a computer savvy as you may noticed but hope this helps...

 

[Tedster]

control panel - admin tools - computer management - disc management

 

[sstrasser86]

im sort of having a similar problem.I have an old hard drive from my desktop computer that stopped working. I decided to upgrade to a new hdd and wanted to use the old drive as an external hd. I have bought a new enclosure for the hd but the computer doesn’t recognize it as a hd. I am using a Maxtor 80gb model: 4d080h4. it came with a Compaq Presario 6000 series. the enclosure im using is a mad dog megavault 3.5". the hdd stopped working while still in my desktop and I couldn’t get it to reboot or reinstall windows. when I give the hdd power, it still sounds like its booting up and the comp with the new hd sees it as a usb device but it doesn’t show up in disk management. The external enclosure does work because I have tested it with other drives. I have also tried to format the drive and I get an error that goes like “data error cyclic redundancy check” I have also tried to format it on my Mac and I get a input/output error.

Any ideas on how to get it to work?

 

[N3051M]

I have an old hard drive from my desktop computer that stopped working

could that have been your clue....?

only way to get it to work again is to RMA it if its still under warranty...