Windows cannot "see" my Multimedia Player hard drive!

Hi all,

Recently, I bought a Hard Disk Multimedia Player (TViX 4100SH with 1TB Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 hard drive) and I am having a really strange issue with it.

The player was working fine for around one month, when suddenly, one day when I plugged the TViX to the PC in order to transfer a few files, Windows Explorer (by the way, I am running Windows Vista Home Premium) coud not find any file on the HD.
I have to remark here that Windows could "see" the TViX HD (it had letter assigned) but it refused to find any of my previously stored files...

Ok it was not a big deal because I had a copy of all those files in my PC, so I decided to use the Windows "Check Disk" tool before copying anything again to the TViX... and here started the serious problems: Windows was unable, not only to find the "lost" files, but also could not access to the TViX HD... I tried everything and nothig worked: I could not use the defrag tool or even to format the HD... I was about to cry when I just tryed unplugging the HD from the TViX and plugging it again. Then I connected again to the PC and... everything was working fine again: I could access to the TViX again, and all the "lost" files were there...

Cool!!, the player worked fine for a couple of days... until yesterday: I had the TViX plugged into the TV and AV Receiver, and I was watching a few clips, and when I was navigating thru the list of videos, the player froze... I run to plug it into the PC, and, what a horror, now Windows cannot even see the TViX HD , not even a letter assigned to it!!
I have tried just everything, but nothing have worked: Windows just cannot see the TViX conected to the PC...

I have searched in some forums before posting (rule #1) and I could read that either moving/deleting files directly thru the TViX remote or managing files thru the FTP program could result in corrupted files that could prevent from the HD to boot correctly. To be honest, the day before of this dissaster, I spent a few hours doing those kind of things: specially copying and renaming files from the PC using a FTP program (CuteFTP), so I want to believe that this a case of corrupted files and not a hardware failure.

Just in case, I plugged another old multimedia player (TViX M 3000U) to the TViX 4100 and tried to play some videos: everything worked fine, so I guess that this is a HD issue... I guess that next step is to plug the TViX HD directly to the PC, but my computer does not have SATA connectors so this is something that I will have to check in a friend's house, so the question now is: is there anything else that I could do regarding this?... pls guys, tell that this is not a hardware failure. I bought the player from a guy in eBay, and sending back the player to Belgium could be a nigtmare.

ANY idea will be truly welcome.

Thanks all in advance.

PS: Sorry for my poor English