Laptop not recognizing hard drive enclosure

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jim
  • Start date Start date
J

Jim

My PC recently failed(the power supply went bad and replacing it
allowed the computer to turn on, but the monitor said no signal
detected so I had problems other than the power supply). I removed
the hard drive from the PC and bought a hard drive enclosure which I
have connected to my laptop via USB. However, I can't seem to get the
laptop to recognize the new hard drive. If I go to Device Manager and
click on Universal Serial Bus Controllers I see 'USB Mass Storage
Device' and when I check the properties the Device Status indicates
that the device is working properly.

I have also checked Disk Management under Computer Management and my
new external drive does not show up.

Any ideas on this would be appreciated!!
 
Does the enclosure have an external power supply and is it connected?

Drives often need more power than the usb port can supply.

Beyond that, there are a variety of other possible causes from being
hooked up incorrectly to a bad drive.

Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]
 
Does the enclosure have an external power supply and is it connected?

Drives often need more power than the usb port can supply.

Beyond that, there are a variety of other possible causes from being
hooked up incorrectly to a bad drive.

Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]
Click to expand...

The enclosure does have an external power supply. It powers up and I
can hear the hard drive spinning in the enclosure. And the green LED
light comes on at the front of the enclosure. The laptop is a Dell
Latitude, and I do get a warning message after plugging in the USB
that says "The number of hard disk drives in your system has
increased. This typically does NOT indicate a hardware failure.
Contact our help desk if you did not personally change your systems
hard disk drive configuration. "

I do fear that the hard drive is damaged. I guess the best way to
check that would be to get a known good drive and see if the laptop
recognizes that?
 
I guess <<

good guess... without having the box in front of me, there's not much I
can add.

One thought is the os/filesystem on the hard drive and the os of the
laptop... for example, win98 can't read ntfs drive info.

Good luck.
 
Jim said:
My PC recently failed(the power supply went bad and replacing it
allowed the computer to turn on, but the monitor said no signal
detected so I had problems other than the power supply). I removed
the hard drive from the PC and bought a hard drive enclosure which I
have connected to my laptop via USB. However, I can't seem to get the
laptop to recognize the new hard drive. If I go to Device Manager and
click on Universal Serial Bus Controllers I see 'USB Mass Storage
Device' and when I check the properties the Device Status indicates
that the device is working properly.

I have also checked Disk Management under Computer Management and my
new external drive does not show up.

Any ideas on this would be appreciated!!
Does the enclosure have an external power supply and is it connected?

Drives often need more power than the usb port can supply.

Beyond that, there are a variety of other possible causes from being
hooked up incorrectly to a bad drive.

Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]
Click to expand...
Click to expand...


Jim said:
The enclosure does have an external power supply. It powers up and I
can hear the hard drive spinning in the enclosure. And the green LED
light comes on at the front of the enclosure. The laptop is a Dell
Latitude, and I do get a warning message after plugging in the USB
that says "The number of hard disk drives in your system has
increased. This typically does NOT indicate a hardware failure.
Contact our help desk if you did not personally change your systems
hard disk drive configuration. "

I do fear that the hard drive is damaged. I guess the best way to
check that would be to get a known good drive and see if the laptop
recognizes that?
Click to expand...


Jim:
In view of your past problem with the PC (I assume it was a desktop machine)
in which this HDD had been installed, it certainly sounds like the problem
may indeed be a defective HDD.

If you do have a "known good drive" at hand, that would be one way to test
whether the USB enclosure itself is not a problem. And what about your
desktop PC? Did you ever get that machine back to functioning? If you did,
obviously one thing to try is to connect the USB HDD to *that* machine for
testing purposes. But I guess you've already tried that or that PC still
isn't functioning, yes? And I don't suppose you have another PC available
that could be used to connect to the USB device.

You should download the HDD diagnostic utility from the manufacturer of your
HDD and test it out. As you may know, the diagnostic utility will take the
form of either a floppy disk or CD, both of which will be bootable. In some
cases, however, the diagnostic utility will not be able to test the drive
while it's a USB device; in those cases you would need to (temporarily)
install it in your (presumably) functioning desktop PC and test it that way.

Assuming the HDD is non-defective, you have tried another USB port on the
laptop, assuming one is available right? I assume you have a flash drive or
other USB device that you can connect to the laptop's USB port and no
problem there, right? And you've tried powering-on the USB device *both*
before & after the boot? And you're not using a USB extension cable, right?

I don't suppose there's any setting in the BIOS of your Dell's motherboard
that would impact on this problem, but check this out with your User Manual
info as it pertains to USB devices.
Anna
 
good guess... without having the box in front of me, there's not much I
can add.

One thought is the os/filesystem on the hard drive and the os of the
laptop... for example, win98 can't read ntfs drive info.

Good luck.
Click to expand...

They are both Windows XP Home Edition so that shouldn't be a
problem. Thanks for the input!
 
My PC recently failed(the power supply went bad and replacing it
allowed the computer to turn on, but the monitor said no signal
detected so I had problems other than the power supply). I removed
the hard drive from the PC and bought a hard drive enclosure which I
have connected to my laptop via USB. However, I can't seem to get the
laptop to recognize the new hard drive. If I go to Device Manager and
click on Universal Serial Bus Controllers I see 'USB Mass Storage
Device' and when I check the properties the Device Status indicates
that the device is working properly.
Click to expand...
I have also checked Disk Management under Computer Management and my
new external drive does not show up.
Click to expand...
Any ideas on this would be appreciated!!
Does the enclosure have an external power supply and is it connected?
Drives often need more power than the usb port can supply.
Beyond that, there are a variety of other possible causes from being
hooked up incorrectly to a bad drive.
Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

The enclosure does have an external power supply. It powers up and I
can hear the hard drive spinning in the enclosure. And the green LED
light comes on at the front of the enclosure. The laptop is a Dell
Latitude, and I do get a warning message after plugging in the USB
that says "The number of hard disk drives in your system has
increased. This typically does NOT indicate a hardware failure.
Contact our help desk if you did not personally change your systems
hard disk drive configuration. "
Click to expand...
I do fear that the hard drive is damaged. I guess the best way to
check that would be to get a known good drive and see if the laptop
recognizes that?
Click to expand...

Jim:
In view of your past problem with the PC (I assume it was a desktop machine)
in which this HDD had been installed, it certainly sounds like the problem
may indeed be a defective HDD.

If you do have a "known good drive" at hand, that would be one way to test
whether the USB enclosure itself is not a problem. And what about your
desktop PC? Did you ever get that machine back to functioning? If you did,
obviously one thing to try is to connect the USB HDD to *that* machine for
testing purposes. But I guess you've already tried that or that PC still
isn't functioning, yes? And I don't suppose you have another PC available
that could be used to connect to the USB device.

You should download the HDD diagnostic utility from the manufacturer of your
HDD and test it out. As you may know, the diagnostic utility will take the
form of either a floppy disk or CD, both of which will be bootable. In some
cases, however, the diagnostic utility will not be able to test the drive
while it's a USB device; in those cases you would need to (temporarily)
install it in your (presumably) functioning desktop PC and test it that way.

Assuming the HDD is non-defective, you have tried another USB port on the
laptop, assuming one is available right? I assume you have a flash drive or
other USB device that you can connect to the laptop's USB port and no
problem there, right? And you've tried powering-on the USB device *both*
before & after the boot? And you're not using a USB extension cable, right?

I don't suppose there's any setting in the BIOS of your Dell's motherboard
that would impact on this problem, but check this out with your User Manual
info as it pertains to USB devices.
Anna- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply Anna,
The PC from which I removed the HDD would not boot before I removed
the HDD and I've given up on getting that back to working condition.
I do have another PC that I can hook the HD enclosure up to - it will
probably be Monday before I do that since the functioning PC is at my
office. If that doesn't work I don't have a PC that I can physically
install the HDD in to run that dagnostic so I may have to give up or
take it somewhere for additional assistance.

I have one USB port on the laptop and a docking station with two
more. I have tried all the ports with no luck and I was able to
connect other devices and they were immediately recognized. And I'm
not using an extension cable. I have tried rebooting the laptop with
the device connected and it still wasn't recognized.

I'll see if I can find a users manual for the mobo and check the BIOS
setting. If that is unproductive and connecting the HDD to another PC
doesn't work I guess I'm out of luck!!

Thanks again for the respsonse!
 
Was the drive jumpered as Master before you put it in the enclosure? Some
PCs use CS (cable select) rather than Master-slave jumpering.

Could be a matter of taking ownership of the drive contents. A new install
of XP would not recognise the user accounts that the drive contents were
created under, leaving them inacessible. If that's the case you can use the
Security settings to take-over ownership of files and folders on the drive.
Might have to unhide hidden folders to see the drive contents.

The drive contents could have been corrupted at the time of the original
power supply failure. It might require repartitioning and formatting.
 
On Jul 21, 12:11 pm, "Beverly Howard [Ms-MVP/MobileDev]"
<BevNoSpamBevHoward.com> wrote:
Does the enclosure have an external power supply and is it connected?
Click to expand...
Drives often need more power than the usb port can supply.
Click to expand...
Beyond that, there are a variety of other possible causes from being
hooked up incorrectly to a bad drive.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

Jim:
In view of your past problem with the PC (I assume it was a desktop
machine)
in which this HDD had been installed, it certainly sounds like the
problem
may indeed be a defective HDD.

If you do have a "known good drive" at hand, that would be one way to
test
whether the USB enclosure itself is not a problem. And what about your
desktop PC? Did you ever get that machine back to functioning? If you
did,
obviously one thing to try is to connect the USB HDD to *that* machine
for
testing purposes. But I guess you've already tried that or that PC still
isn't functioning, yes? And I don't suppose you have another PC available
that could be used to connect to the USB device.

You should download the HDD diagnostic utility from the manufacturer of
your
HDD and test it out. As you may know, the diagnostic utility will take
the
form of either a floppy disk or CD, both of which will be bootable. In
some
cases, however, the diagnostic utility will not be able to test the drive
while it's a USB device; in those cases you would need to (temporarily)
install it in your (presumably) functioning desktop PC and test it that
way.

Assuming the HDD is non-defective, you have tried another USB port on the
laptop, assuming one is available right? I assume you have a flash drive
or
other USB device that you can connect to the laptop's USB port and no
problem there, right? And you've tried powering-on the USB device *both*
before & after the boot? And you're not using a USB extension cable,
right?

I don't suppose there's any setting in the BIOS of your Dell's
motherboard
that would impact on this problem, but check this out with your User
Manual
info as it pertains to USB devices.
Anna
Click to expand...
Click to expand...


Jim said:
Thanks for the reply Anna,
The PC from which I removed the HDD would not boot before I removed
the HDD and I've given up on getting that back to working condition.
I do have another PC that I can hook the HD enclosure up to - it will
probably be Monday before I do that since the functioning PC is at my
office. If that doesn't work I don't have a PC that I can physically
install the HDD in to run that dagnostic so I may have to give up or
take it somewhere for additional assistance.

I have one USB port on the laptop and a docking station with two
more. I have tried all the ports with no luck and I was able to
connect other devices and they were immediately recognized. And I'm
not using an extension cable. I have tried rebooting the laptop with
the device connected and it still wasn't recognized.

I'll see if I can find a users manual for the mobo and check the BIOS
setting. If that is unproductive and connecting the HDD to another PC
doesn't work I guess I'm out of luck!!

Thanks again for the respsonse!
Click to expand...


Jim:
I assume you haven't checked out the HDD with the diagnostic utility as of
yet although it certainly sounds as if you're dealing with a defective
drive.

Anyway...

If & when you do connect the USBEHD to a working PC as you plan, and the
device still remains unrecognized by the system, you could uninstall the
disk from the enclosure and install it as a secondary HDD in that PC to
determine if it's then detected and its contents could be accessed. If not,
that would seem to be definitive evidence that the drive is indeed
defective.
Anna
 
My PC recently failed(the power supply went bad and replacing it
allowed the computer to turn on, but the monitor said no signal
detected so I had problems other than the power supply). I removed
the hard drive from the PC and bought a hard drive enclosure which I
have connected to my laptop via USB. However, I can't seem to get the
laptop to recognize the new hard drive. If I go to Device Manager and
click on Universal Serial Bus Controllers I see 'USB Mass Storage
Device' and when I check the properties the Device Status indicates
that the device is working properly.
I have also checked Disk Management under Computer Management and my
new external drive does not show up.
Any ideas on this would be appreciated!!
On Jul 21, 12:11 pm, "Beverly Howard [Ms-MVP/MobileDev]"
<BevNoSpamBevHoward.com> wrote:
Does the enclosure have an external power supply and is it connected?
Drives often need more power than the usb port can supply.
Beyond that, there are a variety of other possible causes from being
hooked up incorrectly to a bad drive.
The enclosure does have an external power supply. It powers up and I
can hear the hard drive spinning in the enclosure. And the green LED
light comes on at the front of the enclosure. The laptop is a Dell
Latitude, and I do get a warning message after plugging in the USB
that says "The number of hard disk drives in your system has
increased. This typically does NOT indicate a hardware failure.
Contact our help desk if you did not personally change your systems
hard disk drive configuration. "
I do fear that the hard drive is damaged. I guess the best way to
check that would be to get a known good drive and see if the laptop
recognizes that?
Click to expand...
Jim:
In view of your past problem with the PC (I assume it was a desktop
machine)
in which this HDD had been installed, it certainly sounds like the
problem
may indeed be a defective HDD.
If you do have a "known good drive" at hand, that would be one way to
test
whether the USB enclosure itself is not a problem. And what about your
desktop PC? Did you ever get that machine back to functioning? If you
did,
obviously one thing to try is to connect the USB HDD to *that* machine
for
testing purposes. But I guess you've already tried that or that PC still
isn't functioning, yes? And I don't suppose you have another PC available
that could be used to connect to the USB device.
You should download the HDD diagnostic utility from the manufacturer of
your
HDD and test it out. As you may know, the diagnostic utility will take
the
form of either a floppy disk or CD, both of which will be bootable. In
some
cases, however, the diagnostic utility will not be able to test the drive
while it's a USB device; in those cases you would need to (temporarily)
install it in your (presumably) functioning desktop PC and test it that
way.
Assuming the HDD is non-defective, you have tried another USB port on the
laptop, assuming one is available right? I assume you have a flash drive
or
other USB device that you can connect to the laptop's USB port and no
problem there, right? And you've tried powering-on the USB device *both*
before & after the boot? And you're not using a USB extension cable,
right?
I don't suppose there's any setting in the BIOS of your Dell's
motherboard
that would impact on this problem, but check this out with your User
Manual
info as it pertains to USB devices.
Anna
Click to expand...
Click to expand...





Thanks for the reply Anna,
The PC from which I removed the HDD would not boot before I removed
the HDD and I've given up on getting that back to working condition.
I do have another PC that I can hook the HD enclosure up to - it will
probably be Monday before I do that since the functioning PC is at my
office. If that doesn't work I don't have a PC that I can physically
install the HDD in to run that dagnostic so I may have to give up or
take it somewhere for additional assistance.
Click to expand...
I have one USB port on the laptop and a docking station with two
more. I have tried all the ports with no luck and I was able to
connect other devices and they were immediately recognized. And I'm
not using an extension cable. I have tried rebooting the laptop with
the device connected and it still wasn't recognized.
Click to expand...
I'll see if I can find a users manual for the mobo and check the BIOS
setting. If that is unproductive and connecting the HDD to another PC
doesn't work I guess I'm out of luck!!
Click to expand...
Thanks again for the respsonse!
Click to expand...

Jim:
I assume you haven't checked out the HDD with the diagnostic utility as of
yet although it certainly sounds as if you're dealing with a defective
drive.

Anyway...

If & when you do connect the USBEHD to a working PC as you plan, and the
device still remains unrecognized by the system, you could uninstall the
disk from the enclosure and install it as a secondary HDD in that PC to
determine if it's then detected and its contents could be accessed. If not,
that would seem to be definitive evidence that the drive is indeed
defective.
Anna- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

RalfG - The drive was jumpered as master before I put it in the
enclosure - from what I have read that is the correct setting? As
far as taking ownership of the drive contents, I can't even see the
drive at this point.

Anna - On Monday I plan to test that HDD with the enclosure in the
working PC. If that fails, I'll try to find a PC into which I can
install the questionable HDD as a secondary drive. (I'm a little
nervous to do that in the working PC since it actually belongs to the
company I work for.) At that point I will try to run a diagnostic
test on it and I'll know for sure.

Thanks again for all the help and I'll post an update to close the
loop on this problem.
 
My PC recently failed(the power supply went bad and replacing it
allowed the computer to turn on, but the monitor said no signal
detected so I had problems other than the power supply). I removed
the hard drive from the PC and bought a hard drive enclosure which I
have connected to my laptop via USB. However, I can't seem to get the
laptop to recognize the new hard drive. If I go to Device Manager and
click on Universal Serial Bus Controllers I see 'USB Mass Storage
Device' and when I check the properties the Device Status indicates
that the device is working properly.
I have also checked Disk Management under Computer Management and my
new external drive does not show up.
Any ideas on this would be appreciated!!
On Jul 21, 12:11 pm, "Beverly Howard [Ms-MVP/MobileDev]"
<BevNoSpamBevHoward.com> wrote:
Does the enclosure have an external power supply and is it connected?
Drives often need more power than the usb port can supply.
Beyond that, there are a variety of other possible causes from being
hooked up incorrectly to a bad drive.
The enclosure does have an external power supply. It powers up and I
can hear the hard drive spinning in the enclosure. And the green LED
light comes on at the front of the enclosure. The laptop is a Dell
Latitude, and I do get a warning message after plugging in the USB
that says "The number of hard disk drives in your system has
increased. This typically does NOT indicate a hardware failure.
Contact our help desk if you did not personally change your systems
hard disk drive configuration. "
I do fear that the hard drive is damaged. I guess the best way to
check that would be to get a known good drive and see if the laptop
recognizes that?
Jim:
In view of your past problem with the PC (I assume it was a desktop
machine)
in which this HDD had been installed, it certainly sounds like the
problem
may indeed be a defective HDD.
If you do have a "known good drive" at hand, that would be one way to
test
whether the USB enclosure itself is not a problem. And what about your
desktop PC? Did you ever get that machine back to functioning? If you
did,
obviously one thing to try is to connect the USB HDD to *that* machine
for
testing purposes. But I guess you've already tried that or that PC still
isn't functioning, yes? And I don't suppose you have another PC available
that could be used to connect to the USB device.
You should download the HDD diagnostic utility from the manufacturer of
your
HDD and test it out. As you may know, the diagnostic utility will take
the
form of either a floppy disk or CD, both of which will be bootable. In
some
cases, however, the diagnostic utility will not be able to test the drive
while it's a USB device; in those cases you would need to (temporarily)
install it in your (presumably) functioning desktop PC and test it that
way.
Assuming the HDD is non-defective, you have tried another USB port on the
laptop, assuming one is available right? I assume you have a flash drive
or
other USB device that you can connect to the laptop's USB port and no
problem there, right? And you've tried powering-on the USB device *both*
before & after the boot? And you're not using a USB extension cable,
right?
I don't suppose there's any setting in the BIOS of your Dell's
motherboard
that would impact on this problem, but check this out with your User
Manual
info as it pertains to USB devices.
Anna
Click to expand...
news:[email protected]...
Click to expand...
Thanks for the reply Anna,
The PC from which I removed the HDD would not boot before I removed
the HDD and I've given up on getting that back to working condition.
I do have another PC that I can hook the HD enclosure up to - it will
probably be Monday before I do that since the functioning PC is at my
office. If that doesn't work I don't have a PC that I can physically
install the HDD in to run that dagnostic so I may have to give up or
take it somewhere for additional assistance.
I have one USB port on the laptop and a docking station with two
more. I have tried all the ports with no luck and I was able to
connect other devices and they were immediately recognized. And I'm
not using an extension cable. I have tried rebooting the laptop with
the device connected and it still wasn't recognized.
I'll see if I can find a users manual for the mobo and check the BIOS
setting. If that is unproductive and connecting the HDD to another PC
doesn't work I guess I'm out of luck!!
Thanks again for the respsonse!
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Jim:
I assume you haven't checked out the HDD with the diagnostic utility as of
yet although it certainly sounds as if you're dealing with a defective
drive.

If & when you do connect the USBEHD to a working PC as you plan, and the
device still remains unrecognized by the system, you could uninstall the
disk from the enclosure and install it as a secondary HDD in that PC to
determine if it's then detected and its contents could be accessed. If not,
that would seem to be definitive evidence that the drive is indeed
defective.
Anna- Hide quoted text -
Click to expand...
- Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
Click to expand...
- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...

RalfG - The drive was jumpered as master before I put it in the
enclosure - from what I have read that is the correct setting? As
far as taking ownership of the drive contents, I can't even see the
drive at this point.

Anna - On Monday I plan to test that HDD with the enclosure in the
working PC. If that fails, I'll try to find a PC into which I can
install the questionable HDD as a secondary drive. (I'm a little
nervous to do that in the working PC since it actually belongs to the
company I work for.) At that point I will try to run a diagnostic
test on it and I'll know for sure.

Thanks again for all the help and I'll post an update to close the
loop on this problem.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
Click to expand...


Turns out Ralf G. was the warmest. I *thought* the drive was jumpered
as master but it was actually cable select. After changing it to
master, bingo! My laptop now recognizes the enclosure!!

Thanks again to all who took the time to respond. I'm certainly wiser
for the experience...
 
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