External HDD operational problem

I recently upgraded to a new HP a6700f system with Vista Home Premium 64 bit SP1 installed. I have been having continuing problems with Firewire devices which were previously connected to my old system running XP SP2.

I have a four-bay enclosure that accepts IDE devices and converts to Firewire connections via a converter board. I had several extra Western Digital HDDs and a dvd drive installed in this enclosure and had no problems operating under Win XP Pro with SP2 for four years.

However, I have had problems getting this setup to work with Vista. My dvd drive is okay but my HDDs will not start. They are recognized in Device Manager but have the yellow dot with an ! symbol. If I right click on the drive listing in DM an select Properties, I get the message that Vista could not load the drivers properly. If I let Vista search for a solution, and click on View Details it comes back with the message that Vista loaded the driver properly but encountered a problem (which is not specified) when the driver software tried to run.

I have verified extensively that all my hardware is operating properly, all drivers are the latest up to date versions, all physical connections are secure, all cables are working. I have even modified the registry per Microsoft's Hotfixes and Techncial Support....that has solved the original problem with the dvd drive not working, but the HDDs still do not work under Firewire. Each of the drives will operate via USB, but I have $600 worth of Firewire hardware I cannot afford to replace.

Western Digital Tech Support has been no help. They say it is a Vista problem.

HP Tech Support has been equally unhelpful. I don't think they understand what the problem is, so they are clueless as to how to solve it. They keep implying it is a hardare problem.

Microsoft Tech Support has been helping but so far their suggestions have not worked and I have not heard from them in several days. BTW, because my system was pre-loaded with Vista, MS support is not free

Anyone know how to get Vista and Firewire working properly together?

I use firewire/IEE 1394/i Link devices just fine on my vista x64 system

You need to access the event viewer and see exacty what error is ocurring.

You need to provide more info: What is the make and model of the IDE-Firewire external enclosure, and power supply.

What exactly are the WD drives you are trying to Install (type and model- i.e., PATA/SATA/AHCI/SCSI Raptor 3.5" 320GB)

Do you have a driver/software disk, or is it plug and play? (some hardware is not Vista compatable).If you have a disk, did you install it? (XP drivers will not work).

What are the drives formated to? NTFS/SIMPLE/BASIC? with assigned drive letters? These drives may have to be re-formated through Vista, under the manage Utility and re-assigned drive letters.

Do they show up under the manage Utility? like this?

How do I access the "event viewer"? That might shed some light if it contains enough information....


There are no drivers provided by the Firewire enclosure manufacturer. It uses drivers included in XP/Vista and is completely plug and play. And please note that the IDE-to-Firewire setup works fine with an HP Lightscribe drive, so this is not a Vista-hardware incompatibility....I suspect it is some problem with the WDC-Vista driver. Either a parameter or value or configuration setting needs to be altered.


The Western Digital drives have all been checked against the Compatibility list for Vista. All the drives are compatible.

All drives are EIDE PATA drives. The two that are formatted (let's ignore the new drive since I can't get it to show up to be formatted) were formatted as simple NTFS drives with a single partition on each. The drives do not show up in Disk Management Utility.

pdef1949 said:

How do I access the "event viewer"? That might shed some light if it contains enough information....


There are no drivers provided by the Firewire enclosure manufacturer. It uses drivers included in XP/Vista and is completely plug and play. And please note that the IDE-to-Firewire setup works fine with an HP Lightscribe drive, so this is not a Vista-hardware incompatibility....I suspect it is some problem with the WDC-Vista driver. Either a parameter or value or configuration setting needs to be altered.


The Western Digital drives have all been checked against the Compatibility list for Vista. All the drives are compatible.

All drives are EIDE PATA drives. The two that are formatted (let's ignore the new drive since I can't get it to show up to be formatted) were formatted as simple NTFS drives with a single partition on each. The drives do not show up in Disk Management Utility.

Click to expand...

Plug them all back into the pc, then run diagnostics:

Control Panel>system and Maintenance>Performance Information and Tools> Advanced tools (under task)>