ESATA external hard drive not recognized on laptop

[ergodyne85]

hi everyone,

i got an external enclosure for my old SATA hard drives both 250GBs (WD2500KS Caviar) and tried to hook it up via eSATA cable on my Thinkpad T510. For some reason its not recognizing the drive at all but when i use my USB, it works just fine and recognized it immediately as an external harddrive. if anyone can help with this conundrum that would be great.

thanks.

 

[electrontau]

was the power cable plugged in?

 

[ergodyne85]

yup, the power cable was on. when i plug it in via USB it works perfectly. i just don't know why it won't read via esata cable.

 

[MrLinux]

What OS?
Something like XP only supports hot plugging with the help of additional drivers.

 

[ergodyne85]

I'm using Win7 Pro 64bit.
is there anything i'm missing in terms of drivers? I went on Lenovo's website and have everything up to date i believe.

 

[Snipergod87]

In order to use hot swapping for eSATA you will need either AHCI or RAID set in the BIOS. Legacy (IDE) mode will not work, it will only regonize the drive on boot.

 

[ergodyne85]

i went on my BIOS and had it on AHCI enabed. do i keep the cable plugged in when i restart?

 

[icy dock]

Hey ergodyne85,

There shouldn't be issues with plugging in the cable when you restart. If you still experience issues, try switching eSATA cables as there are times when it could just be a bad cable.

Hope this helps with your question!

 

[ergodyne85]

Thanks a lot. I'm going to try to get a new one if possible. Will let you know.