Vista - External USB hard drive not recognized

I have two IDE hard disks, to be used as external hard disks for backups.

For this purpose I bought two NexStar hard drive enclosures, with an IDE/USB
interface. The first one, a Maxtor 60 GB disk, works fine.

With the second one I have a problem:

The hard disk for the second one is an IBM Deskstar, 80 GB. Prior to
installing it into the enclosure its partitions had been deleted, so there
was one unallocated and unformatted space, for re-formatting, once connected
to a PC.

The following problems/symptoms are identical under WinXP SP-2 and Vista
Ultimate, on two different machines, both using SATA for their internal hard
disks:

When connected to either machine, in the bios boot sequence the ‘new’ USB
disk is shown. In the device manager it shows, either as ‘working properly’
or as having ‘no drivers installed’. Flipping the on/off switch on the case,
there is the typical sound of a new device having been connected or
disconnected. However, under control panel > computer management > disk
management it does not show up. It also does not show up in Windows Explorer
or My Computer.

Using Partition Magic, I created a 5GB partition using the NTFS file system,
no change.

I did swap the enclosures, no change. So, a faulty IDE/USB interface in the
enclosure has essentially been ruled out.

In further efforts to resolve the issue, I mounted the disk into a desktop,
checked it & completely formatted it. Mounted it again in its external case.
This time the device manager clearly listed it under disks as an external
USB device with the correct IBM identification.

Again, it would not show up in My Computer, Windows Explorer, &/or in Disk
Management.

The disk is clearly not faulty. The external case with IDE/USB interface is
not faulty. It appears to be a software issue which appears identically in
WinXP SP2 & in Win Vista.

Also, If one boots up or down with the external disk connected, booting up
or down takes about 20 minutes.

Peter K wrote:
> I have two IDE hard disks, to be used as external hard disks for backups.
....
> The hard disk for the second one is an IBM Deskstar, 80 GB...

Well, this may be relevant, depending on when the disk was manufactured.
A few years back (can't recall just when) the Deskstar was dubbed the
'Deathstar' because they failed so often and so catastrophically.

Sometime after that disaster, IBM sold its disk drive division to
Hitachi, just to bid farewell to the whole bad experience.

Since that sale to Hitachi I've had no experience with the Deskstar
brand, so I can't offer any firsthand advice. I did notice that soon
thereafter the Deskstar line was offered at fire-sale prices at my
local geek store, but I resisted the temptation to bargain-hunt.

I'd like some feedback from anyone who has had recent first-hand
experience with the Hitachi/Deskstar brand.

The disk is five years old. It has served as the main disk in a machine I
built then. It has never given me any trouble or unexplained malfunctions
and reformatting it just now, using Disk Management, all three partitions
were reported as 'healthy'.

Still, that could be the reason???

Peter K


"Don" wrote:

> Peter K wrote:
> > I have two IDE hard disks, to be used as external hard disks for backups.
> ....
> > The hard disk for the second one is an IBM Deskstar, 80 GB...
>
> Well, this may be relevant, depending on when the disk was manufactured.
> A few years back (can't recall just when) the Deskstar was dubbed the
> 'Deathstar' because they failed so often and so catastrophically.
>
> Sometime after that disaster, IBM sold its disk drive division to
> Hitachi, just to bid farewell to the whole bad experience.
>
> Since that sale to Hitachi I've had no experience with the Deskstar
> brand, so I can't offer any firsthand advice. I did notice that soon
> thereafter the Deskstar line was offered at fire-sale prices at my
> local geek store, but I resisted the temptation to bargain-hunt.
>
> I'd like some feedback from anyone who has had recent first-hand
> experience with the Hitachi/Deskstar brand.
>
>

Peter K wrote:
> The disk is five years old. It has served as the main disk in a machine I
> built then. It has never given me any trouble or unexplained malfunctions
> and reformatting it just now, using Disk Management, all three partitions
> were reported as 'healthy'.
>
> Still, that could be the reason???

I would only be guessing, either way. This link will give you just
a taste of the subject, and it mentions 2000-2005. I'm almost
positive that 75Gig drives were not the only ones affected.

http://www.ibmdeskstar75gxplitigation.com/