External HD not present in XP

[joe_71]

I have a Seagate Baracuda 7200.10, 160 GB HD in an external case.
While deleting partitions on this drive, my computer crashed. It
wouldn't boot back to XP, so I turned it off and back on. Nothing
would happen, so I turned the EHD off. Now, I was able to get to XP,
but when I turned the EHD back on, it wouldn't appear in My Computer
anymore. I can safely remove it as "Generic USB disk USB device", but
nothing else can be done.

It is being recognised in Computer Managment - Device Manager as
Generic USB disk USB device, and as "Mass storage device" attached on
an USB port.

It is not being recognized under Storage - Disk managment. Therefore
it is impossible to format, initialize it or do anything like this.
When I choose properties of the "Generic USB disk USB device", there
are no data under the Volume tab. When I hit the populate button, it
says that the disk is unreadable and the partition style is not
applicable.

Most likely, the Master Boot Record (MBR) has been damaged. There is a
number of programs on the internet that can fix that problem, but only
if the drive is being recognised as a HD.

It isn't the power supply, the case works fine with another HD.
I tried to find a solution on the web, no luck so far. I need a way to
"tell" the XP that there is a HD on the USB port, not some "Generic
USB disk USB device".

Thanks for any suggestions...

 

[Paperdoc]

Look again in Disk Management. A functioning hardware storage device like a hard drive that is not readable by Windows still will show up if you look in the right place. In Disk Management, look at the LOWER RIGHT pane, and realize that it SCROLLS so you can see all devices. Since you were in the process of deleting Partitions, I am hoping you intended to delete them ALL and start with a blank disk. You should see the drive in this lower right pane, and it probably has some material on it. RIGHT-click on any Partition you see there and delete it. Do this for all such Partitions. Do NOT do this if you planned to save some of the Partitions - once you delete one, it is GONE!

When you have nothing but Unallocated Space on the disk unit, RIGHT-click on that and Create a Primary Partition of whatever size you need. If you plan not to boot from this unit, do not make it bootable. If you find yourself in a wizard that helps you and offers choices on Format options, choose an NTFS File System and I suggest the Full Format option. That will take MANY hours and do a thorough test of the whole disk for any troublesome sectors. If, on the other hand, there are no Format option choices in sight, do the Partition Creation step. Then come back and RIGHT-click again on the Partition you just created and choose to Format it. Set the options and run that task.

I would hope that lets you clean up the disk and use it.

 

[joe_71]

Look again in Disk Management. A functioning hardware storage device like a hard drive that is not readable by Windows still will show up if you look in the right place. In Disk Management, look at the LOWER RIGHT pane, and realize that it SCROLLS so you can see all devices. Since you were in the process of deleting Partitions, I am hoping you intended to delete them ALL and start with a blank disk. You should see the drive in this lower right pane, and it probably has some material on it. RIGHT-click on any Partition you see there and delete it. Do this for all such Partitions. Do NOT do this if you planned to save some of the Partitions - once you delete one, it is GONE!

When you have nothing but Unallocated Space on the disk unit, RIGHT-click on that and Create a Primary Partition of whatever size you need. If you plan not to boot from this unit, do not make it bootable. If you find yourself in a wizard that helps you and offers choices on Format options, choose an NTFS File System and I suggest the Full Format option. That will take MANY hours and do a thorough test of the whole disk for any troublesome sectors. If, on the other hand, there are no Format option choices in sight, do the Partition Creation step. Then come back and RIGHT-click again on the Partition you just created and choose to Format it. Set the options and run that task.

I would hope that lets you clean up the disk and use it.

Thanks for you effort, but as I explained earlier, the device is not present in Disk management; therefore nothing can be seen if I scroll, or if I maximize the window...

 

[pjmelect]

In cases like this I have taken the hard disk out of its case and fitted it in the computer to the IDE or SATA interface. The hard disk may not be dead the fault may be with the enclosures USB interface. Once the drive is fitted in your computer you will be able to try and remove your data or try and re partition and format the drive. You also will be able to run the hard drives manufactures diagnostic software from their web site.

 

[joe_71]

In cases like this I have taken the hard disk out of its case and fitted it in the computer to the IDE or SATA interface. The hard disk may not be dead the fault may be with the enclosures USB interface. Once the drive is fitted in your computer you will be able to try and remove your data or try and re partition and format the drive. You also will be able to run the hard drives manufactures diagnostic software from their web site.

It's the first thing I tried, cause I thought the case isn't working properly, but I could not be sure. I set the jumpers to slave, connected it and made sure that BIOS is recognizing it. That's all that I was able to do, cause after aplying the new settings, the computer wouldn't boot to XP, it would just freeze. I connected it correctly and the jumper settings are correct. I also tried different variations of connecting, nothing worked...

Thank you for your effort.

 

[Guest]

http://www.icare-recovery.com/partition-recovery.html

Your problem could be fixed and it is presented on this page.

Enitialize your drive or not depends on the data or not. If there is no vital information on the drive, just go enitialize it and format it to fix the problems. Some times it might be the virus, or bad boot sector that caused this.

You can also try check disk to check the bad sectors on the track. It does not cost a penny.

If there is vital information? You got to pay someone or some tool since that makes the whole thing complicated.

 

[Paperdoc]

You say, "I set the jumpers to slave, ....". I do hope that you actually have an IDE drive (not SATA) AND that you had it connected to the middle of an IDE ribbon cable that already had a Master drive connected to the end of that same cable. Those are the ONLY conditions under which you should set jumpers to Slave. If that is not your setup, let us know details of what is so we can advise.

 

[pjmelect]

One trick I do when I connect an unknown IDE hard drive to my computers IDE leads is to set the jumper on the hard drive to master, remove the IDE lead to the CD ROM drive(s) connect it to the end of the IDE cable and make sure that the secondary master is set to Auto in the BIOS. By doing this you will have eliminated any possible incompatibilities.

If it still does not work then you have a dead drive and if you can’t afford to have the data on it professionally recovered then you could try the refrigerator trick which is to put the hard drive in a plastic bag into the fridge for 20 minutes and then retest if it still does not work then do the refrigerator trick again and this time give it a sharp tap on the side of the hard drive if this doesn’t work then bin it.

 

[joe_71]

http://www.icare-recovery.com/partition-recovery.html

Your problem could be fixed and it is presented on this page.

Enitialize your drive or not depends on the data or not. If there is no vital information on the drive, just go enitialize it and format it to fix the problems. Some times it might be the virus, or bad boot sector that caused this.

You can also try check disk to check the bad sectors on the track. It does not cost a penny.

If there is vital information? You got to pay someone or some tool since that makes the whole thing complicated.

Nope, it isn't working. The program recognizes it as a "Generic USB Disk", but it doesn't let me do anything. It just shows RAW files and a folder with a question mark on it...

The files on the disk aren't important. I was formatting the HD when it stopped working: it's about using the HD again...

 

[Paperdoc]

If you are not trying to save any data on this unit, I suggest using Disk Management to Delete any and all Partitions it contains. When you are back to NO Partitions and only Unallocated Space, then Create a new Primary Partition (not bootable) that can be used for data. Make it the size you want (up to full HDD space) and Format it with the NTSC file system.

What I'm thinking is that trying to Format an existing Partition that has scrambled data in the Partition Table may not work. Going right back to no Partitions and then creating one will re-write the Partition Table, hopefully with good data.