Windows not Recognizing USB Devices
 

Okay... my external USB hard drive was working fine until yesterday, when I had to move it to another computer elsewhere and try to copy files to it. Windows gave me an error message saying it can't be recognized. And just now, when I hooked up my HD back to my main computer it gives me the same error. I tried the troubleshooting already but it doesn't do anything.

I'd appreciate the assistance. Here's a few screens if it may help:

I use an Eye Toy as a PC webcam, and every time I plug it in I get this. However, if I just leave it, it eventually stops (usually after 5/10 minutes) and then works perfectly.

If you uninstall your USB controllers in device manager and then re-install them, that apparently fixes the problem.

Make sure you have a PS/2 mouse (or a USB - PS/2 mouse converter) handy, it'll make it alot less annoying ;)

Check your bios and make sure USB 2.0 support is enabled, along with 1.1 support.

I've had this problem with an external hard drive of mine. I have three, but at one point, one of them did not start up correctly in an enclosure, even though it started fine if it was inside the computer itself.

Sadly, the solution was to format it and run SpinRite on it. There were some faulty sectors on it, apparently.

There's no saying this is for sure your problem. Have you tried putting the hard drive inside your computer? Best way to tell if it's it's the enclosure or the drive.

@ Roph and BIGWORM: I'll try those methods later today - thanks.

I don't see why I'd have to - I'd have to take my USB HD apart to do so. It looks like this, but mine holds 250GB and not 200GB. I really don't know a whole lot about hardware in general either.

In that case, try to get support from the manufacturer and/or vendor.

I was having a similar problem with a hard drive I put in an external enclosure. Once I plugged it into the USB ports in the back of my computer rather than the ones in the front, Windows was able to recognize it properly.

I tried all the different USB ports in my computer as well, though none of them worked. My relative is a computer expert and since we can't find a solution, we'd have to take the casing off and hook up the hard drive inside the computer. It's more about trying to save 150GB worth of data more than anything else.

Hehe... I almost thought I made that post because of the avatar/signature.

So you uninstalled the USB-ports without any succes?

I uninstalled the USB port that I always use for plugging my hard drive into, and reinstalled it. No success. I haven't uninstalled the other ports, maybe I should?

Won't hurt anyone.

Make sure the connections for your headers on the mobo are clean and correct if that's what you're referring to. If nothing's good after that, I'd sum it up as a mobo problem.

Okay, here's the story.

I took my hard drive to my relative's house yesterday to get it looked over, and we found out that there was nothing wrong with my computer or the hard drive itself - the problem was with the casing, since it has its own circuitboard and a piece of it had broken off after close inspection.

Nothing was lost on the hard drive, fortunately. We opened up the drive and placed it inside my relative's computer and it worked perfectly fine.

I guess the lesson here is to keep the HD in one specific spot all of the time, otherwise you're bound to encounter problems from handling it too often. That, or, if you buy a brand new hard drive, to always format the drive so the type changes from a FAT32 to another kind of hard drive type (which I forget).

I emailed the company that made the hard drive to get a replacement casing, and then I'm good to go.

Not that I'm expecting anyone to care, but if you did, well, now you know.