Some general additional info.... (I 've skimmed but not haven't "fully digested" the info in latest post from starstorm2000)
An interesting observation: all 3 who’ve posted problems to this thread:
delux269 (who originally started the thread),
ackalaka and
starstorm2000 you're all formatted FAT32.
Notes on FAT vs NTFS formatting
1) Xbox and MP3 players as well as other consumer devices (not computers) might require FAT32
2) But if at all possible (e.g. you only connect to your hard drive to own and/or other computers) best to use NTFS not FAT32 formatted data
=> You can re-format the entire drive NTFS (which wipes any current data)
=> Or do a convert (which should preserve current data as it changes the formatting from FAT32->NTFS)
=> just fyi.. I’m not aware of a tool that converts formatting from NTFS back to FAT32. This would require a full drive reformat to FAT32 which wipes any current data from the drive.
3) NTFS incurs a bit more system overhead but is more fault-resistant
4) I don’t own/use Xbox so don’t know nor have I tried to check.. but does anyone else know if Xbox requires the entire drive is FAT32 or does it allow for one FAT32 partition to exist on the drive? Such that you’re able to format other drive partition(s) as NTFS?
ALSO:
You can look [post=701478]at this post [/post] (updated). You might choose to build/test from a bootable CD to see if:
=> You can recover your data using the boot CD
=> The problem only occurs when loading/running the software you have stored on your hard drive. The problem might not occur if running strictly from software burned onto the CD. (e.g. if a virus or Windows bug is causing the problem)
=> The post mentioned above also tells how to check if system level errors are occuring when running running Linux off the CD (vs. Windows from your hard drive). If you find Linux system level errors probably indicates Windows system level occurs are ocurring as well
And in any case, check Windows Event Logs
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308427 System and Application logs for any indication of errors related to your USB hard drive