Generic USB to IDE Adapter Problems
 

My sister's laptop died a day or so ago, so I planned on getting it fixed, but we determined it would be too expensive to get it repaired (its a 5 year old machine now, and to repair all that would be potentially wrong with it would cost nearly as much as getting a new one). I still needed a way to get the files off the hard drive (it has financial stuff and such that'd be really nice to get back), so I recently bought a generic USB to IDE (both 2.5 and 3.5) adapter today (I had only planned on getting an IDE 2.5 to 3.5 Adapter, but I was talked into getting this one at PC Club... and if it worked well enough, it would be worth it since I have my niece's old hard drive to put on her new laptop).

The problem is that I can't get it to install on either my Desktop or my laptop. I plug the cable into the USB port and (the first few times) little pop-ups would come up saying something like USB to IDE found... then Mass USB Storage found and would play the hardware added sound... it would appear in the computers device manager for about 15 seconds before the hardware removed sound would play and it would dissapear from the device list.

The Mini CD that came with the drive only comes with Windows 98 and Mac drivers... and I'm using Windows XP. I also tried a 3.5 hard drive, powered up with the external power cord it comes with, and couldn't get it to show up on the computer either. Someone suggested renaming the drive paths, but I could only change the main hard drive (which I didn't want to change) or the DVD-Burner I have installed. I changed the DVD from D to E then to Q... and still no luck. I've tried to google for an answer, but nothing specific enough to help, and its really annoying to sift through so many advertisements/shop pages for the adapter itself rather than help installing it.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I've had too many computer problems lately and for something thats supossed to be plug and play and require no drivers... I'm about at my limit of patience with it all.

So yes, thankupo you very much for any help anyone can provide.

Check the site for updates.

Also, most of the times you need to install the drivers before plugging the thing in.

There doesn't seem to be a brand anywhere on the box, cable, CD, or manual. So I can't really check the company's site if I don't know where its from...

http://www.pcclub.com/product_detail...temno=A1242906

PC Club, where I bought it, considers the brand to be "Generic" :rolleyes:

The only drivers on the CD were for Mac and Windows 98. Even though I'm using XP, I tried using the Windows 98 drivers... but that just led to an error (even though it was accompanied by a little pop-up window saying that drivers were installed succesfully... not that it actually did anything).

Edit: I also tried to get the adapter to work on my old Windows 98 machine... and still no use... it just took longer to figure out it wasn't going to work again...

Alright... I realized that my adapter was a dud, so I got a new one... its working as it should... the problem now has to do with the harddrive I was trying to recover the data from.

The hard drive is a Toshiba MK1016GAP 10.005GB

The label reads CYL16383,H16, S63 (which I assume are cylinders, heads, sectors) and under that (LBA 19,640,880Sectors)

I finally get the USB to IDE adapter to work and it will only find the name of the drive. When I go to remove hardware its type name is read correctly. It says its at location 0, and when I go under its properties and under volume it reads:

Disk: Disk 1
Type: Unkown
Status: Unreadable
Partition Style: Not Applicable
Capacity: 0 MB
Unallocated Space: 0 MB
Reserved Space: 0 MB

I bought an internal 2.5 to 3.5 IDE Adapter and tried to boot my computer with it hooked in with my other drive. After a long time (and bending a pin on the adapter away since normal IDE cables have the hole filled in) I got it to boot... well do something at least.

It started up asking for a boot disk. Well as horrible as it was to see, it was better than not knowing what the heck was wrong with it and the laptop.

So I saw that another person in this subforum had harddrive problems, so I downloaded TestDisk and it noticed the drive (as well as my normal hard drive). I selected Intel Partiton and tried to Analyse (It read Read error at .... for every sector it checked)... It didn't list any partitians and said Structure: Ok.. Then no partitians found or selected for memory. I tried the search deeper option with the same results. I wasn't sure what to do next, so I adjusted the geometry to what I figured was what listed on the label ... its at 8% and its still having read errors now... I didn't change the sector size as it precautioned it as dangerous... and the sector size wasn't on the label (unless its LBA 19,640,880Sectors... which I guess could be the sectors... and maybe the S63 was the sector size...)


I don't know... for both the hard drive and the laptop monitor to die at the same time, I'm thinking someone must have dropped it or done something to it. I mean I could see the monitor, or maybe even the harddrive, but both?

*sighs* Oh well, if anyone has any idea how we can recover any of the data (there is really only the Quicken information on there that is really neccessary, since its where my mom kept practically all of last years financial information on)... then again if the hard drive is dead... then its dead. My dad wants to take it somewhere to have it checked... but I figure that they'll want to charge so much just to look at it and then another extreme amount to copy anything that may be salvagable (which I'm guessing isn't very likely)

Thanks again in advance... any help is very greatly appreciated.

Check to make sure the adaptor doesn't require the Jumper to be in a certain position.

Well I tried booting the laptop's hard drive by itself and it still had the boot failure (wouldn't it have been considered the master then and not in need of jumpers... as I'm assuming that no jumpers is the master setting for a laptop hard drive)... There were no jumpers with it... The pins are closer together and I can't use standard jumpers. Looking on google, they call them 2mm mini jumpers. I have no idea where I could even get one jumper to even test it out, I didn't even know they existed before about a week ago... I can see where the jumpers could potentially go, but there isn't a jumper diagram on the label. Other sites said that the extra pins where manufactured specific and generally had no function. I'm assuming that using 2.5" drives outside of laptops is generally rare or unheard of as its been rather difficult finding information regarding this/these issues.

I had a similar experience with another hard drive (3.5", not 2.5") with the jumpers set incorrectly, but I'm pretty sure it appeared in "My Computer." Then again I could be wrong... it was a while back when I was testing this new (working) cable.

If all I need is a jumper, does anyone know where I could find one? Would a Radio Shack have one? I saw an auction on ebay, but I didn't need as many as they offered and it was too expensive for those tiny jumpers (unless it would solve the problem, then it beats the alternative)

EDIT: I tried using the jumper off an old 3.5" hard drive (I guess they do kind of fit).. i tried it in both vertical and both horizontal positions and still no luck. Thanks though, I appreciate the help.