2nd hard drive

  • Thread starter Thread starter keith
  • Start date Start date
K

keith

I recently discovered that when I go into My Computer, my
2nd hard drive (F:) is no longer listed. When I go to
system manager, it is listed and it tells me the device
is working properly. But for some reason the computer
does not list it. I uninstalled the drive and re-
installed it. The computer recognizes it when it is re-
installed, but still does not list it in My Computer. Is
there a way I can remedy this. The pc still has it
listed in it's device list, but I cannot access the drive
at all.

Thanks
 
Right click on My Computer and select Manage.

On the following screen, click on Disk Management.

The F:\ drive should show up on the right hand side of the screen. What
does XP say about this drive? Is it assigned a drive letter?

Cari
www.coribright.com
 
The answer in contained in a Western Digital tech support
response which I found on their website today; I had the
same exact problem you have. When following the
instructions below when it comes to formating your disk
just click no (unless you want to formate it) and when
the wizard finishes you hard drive will show up in the My
Computer.

How to install, partition, and format a FireWire, USB, or
Combo hard drive in Windows XP.

Question
How do I install, partition, and format an external
hard drive (FireWire, USB, Combo) in Windows XP?

Answer
Windows XP has the full driver support necessary to
support Western Digital external hard drives. The
external hard drives ship with a single FAT32 partition
for the full drive capacity. In most cases, you may
simply connect the external hard drive to an available
FireWire or USB port on your computer. The external hard
drive should be recognized and ready for use.
Occasionally, the factory partition may not be recognized
in Windows. If that is the case, use Disk Management
within Windows XP to install (partition and format) the
external hard drive.

To partition and format the external hard drive with Disk
Management, follow these steps:


Right-click on My Computer.


Select Manage to bring up the Windows Computer Management
interface.


Click on the Disk Management folder under Storage in the
left-hand panel.


Right-click on the space (the external hard drive) you
want to work with. This space is represented by a white
box with a black bar on top listing the available space
on the drive as Unallocated.


Select New Partition.


The Welcome to the New Partition Wizard appears. Click
Next to continue and select Primary. Click Next.


Select the size of the partition you wish to create and
click Next.


At the next screen, select a drive letter to assign to
the partition and click Next.


The Format Partition screen appears. On this screen you
can select the file system, allocation unit size, and
volume label you wish to create on the drive.

Note: In almost all cases, it is best to leave the
allocation unit size at default. If you are not dual-
booting and do not need to use this drive on a Windows 98
SE or Windows ME computer, it is also recommended that
you use NTFS as the file system (you can also select
FAT16 or FAT32). Dynamic partitions cannot be created on
an external hard drive. The Windows 2000 and Windows XP
Disk Management utility cannot support the format of a
FAT32 partition larger than 32GB. Please refer to
Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 184006 for additional
information.


Click Next to verify the process and the choices you
selected.


Click Finish to complete the process.
 
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