# Cannot access external hard drive



## Ram085 (Feb 9, 2003)

Western Digital external harddrive connected to a USB port
It was working fine
It is listed in Device Manager
When I go to Device Manager ang click Properties, message says it is working properly
I removed it an rebooted ang got the new device found message
The system must see it on boot-up as the activity light flashes
I am running Win XP Pro
Any help would be appreciated.
Bob


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## kiwiguy (Aug 17, 2003)

Is it initialised and formatted, or is it a new clean drive?


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## Ram085 (Feb 9, 2003)

It is a drive that has been in use.


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## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

Right click My Computer, Manage, Disk Management. See what the status of that drive is in Disk Management.


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## Ram085 (Feb 9, 2003)

Disk 3
Basic
74.53GB
Online

Unallocated


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## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

Well, disk management thinks it's unformatted. Since you think it is, I suspect it's time to try a data recovery application to see what you can recover.


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## Ram085 (Feb 9, 2003)

JohnWill said:


> Well, disk management thinks it's unformatted. Since you think it is, I suspect it's time to try a data recovery application to see what you can recover.


Ok, But how do I try data recovery if I cant access the drive?


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## Ram085 (Feb 9, 2003)

Accually, I don't care about the data. I just want to be able to access the drive.


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## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

In that case, right click on the drive in Disk Management, partition and format it.


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## Ram085 (Feb 9, 2003)

Formatting the drive from Disk Management, did the trick. Thanx much.


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## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

*You can mark your own threads solved using the thread tools at the upper right of the screen.©*


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