HELP!!! external hard drive problems

big_d_4

hi all,

today i unplugged my external 250gb hard drive from my desktop (which i use as a media centre) and plugged it into my laptop so i could re-tag all my mp3's.

now when i plug the usb back into the pc or laptop it wont recognise it and says it needs to search for the software for it, which it doesnt have as its a plug and play hard drive.

it has over 180gb of music backed up dvds and uni work that i need. it is a toshiba external usb hard drive if that helps.

i really need help on this, the thought of losing everything doesnt bare thinking about at all.

please help.

_pale_

Benjie_2

If its bringing up the found new hardware wizard I would suggest just keep pressing continue as it may find the plug and play drivers it need for the external hard drive. This is assuming you are using windows xp. Doing this shouldnt change any of the data on the drive as all its doing is installing it.

big_d_4

i have tried that, but it just says that the software is not found.

i also renamed the external hard drive, but now it wont even recognise it as the name i gave it, something co pletely different.

scorour

It's not really the hard drive that is plug and play directly, more the USB interface and connection hard drive.

Certainly sounds like a driver issue, if you are still struggling, it is most likely a PATA device inside the case, you could (bit of a mess about) take the drive out and cable it as a slave device and connect to your current internal IDE cable, this will give you access to get important info off.

Before that tho', I would try and resolve the driver issue, check the manufacturer website for any relevant info, do Windows update to check drivers, also, if XP, do you have at least SP1 (prefer SP2) installed as this handles USB better.

TBH, it does seem strange both machines do not recognize the device, so I would defo start checking with Toshiba 1st.

jaws77

You could connect the device then uninstall in the device manager and restart the pc, this should force a reinstall of the drivers and sort the problem.

big_d_4

jaws77 wrote:

You could connect the device then uninstall in the device manager and restart the pc, this should force a reinstall of the drivers and sort the problem.

its not recognising the device at all, not even in devise manager.