Blue screen of death associated with external USB 2.0 hard drive

[Kwad Guy]

I've seen the following problem several times now...looking for comments:

I'm running Win2K.

I attach a USB 2.0 external hard drive (QPS 80gb 7200rpm) to a computer with USB 2.0 ports on the motherboard (Dell Dimension 8250). At some point, I try to remove the drive by right clicking the device icon in the right hand corner. I try to stop the drive, but it tells me the "resource is busy". I'm not running anything that's accessing the drive, I have no exporer windows open to that drive, etc. But somehow I still get that message. I can try and try again, and still get that message.

OK, so I power down the computer from the <ctrl><alt><del> window (that is, properly). The machine powers down. I disconnect the hard drive. I boot up again and encounter a blue screen of death.

If I restart again, I'll still get the BSOD. The only way I can get around that is to boot into safe mode with the usb 2.0 device attached then reboot into safe mode without the USB 2.0 device attached. THEN, at this point, I can keep the USB 2.0 device unattached and boot properly into Win2K.

Any suggestions?

Kwad

 

[sunkim50]

Don't know the answer, but I had the same dumb problem hooking up a USB2 Sony MiniDV Cam. It was on a Dell Dimension 4550.

I think there is something wierd with the built-in USB controller.

I hope your solution works for me too.

Good Luck

 

[Kwad Guy]

I'm not discounting the possibility that this may have to do with the fact that the Dell Dimensions (both 4550 and 8250) use the VIA USB 2.0 controllers. Most people HATE the VIA USB 2.0 controller (see www.usbman.com, for example)...Preference is definitely for the NEC USB 2.0 controller. More recently, ALi introduced a USB 2.0 controller. Jury is out on that one.

But back to the point: The Dell computers use the VIA USB 2.0 controller...which may be a source of the problem.

In addition to the problem with the USB 2.0 hard drive (documented above), I've had no success getting a USB 2.0 external DVD writer to work on the Dells, although it works fine on other computers.

Kwad