the vanishing hard drive

Computer Forum Storage Devices
1

I own a 70 GB western digital series II USB hard drive:

Serial Number: WMAJ51514402
Model Number: WD800B008

This device worked find up until december 24th–I had it plugged in to my computer and was downloading a large number of avi files onto it (legit). I left to attend a short function and returned to find an error message sating that my e: drive (the external) had been unplugged, I checked and found it was still attached. I unplugged it from my computer and then plugged it back in–it appeared but only 1 folder showed up when I explored the drive with windows explorer. Now windows does not recognize my hard drive, when I plug it into my computer it appears in the device manager as “USB mass storage device” but it does not appear as a drive on windows explorer. I am stumped, and worried as many important files were on this drive.

2

If you got any additonal drivers for it, try reinstalling them.

Also try using the add new hardware wizard,search for new hardware and let windows search for a driver for itself.

3

Tried that–now the drive shows up on the diagnositc tool “western digital has their own diagnostic tool” but not in explorer, when I ran a test in the diagnostic it said “cable error” but my usb cable looks fine.

4

Have you checked whether the drive is mounted to a drive letter in the Windows volume manager?

5

[QUOTE=Anti-Trend]
Have you checked whether the drive is mounted to a drive letter in the Windows volume manager?
[/QUOTE]

Sorry about this–but I am a total n00b and I’m not sure how to acces the volume manager.

6

Update: found the volume manager but the hard drive does not appear there eaither, it only appears in the device manager.