How to get Windows XP to recognize old HDs?

essential

Senior member
Aug 28, 2004
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Hello,

My father had two HDs in an old machine, Windows 3.1 old. I tried hooking these HDs up to our newer machines with an external USB enclosure. The problem is Windows won't load them as viewable. They show up under Computer Management, but I can't assign them a drive letter or anything. The drives themselves are small, I just want to be able to copy their contents into a folder on the current HD. Anyone know how to do this in Windows. Do I need special software? Thanks for any help.


What the drives look like in Computer Management:
http://i65.photobucket.com/alb...oto_hosting/oldhds.jpg
For whatever reason one drives shows up as one FAT and one FAT32 drive, neither with a drive letter.
 

RebateMonger

Elite Member
Dec 24, 2005
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Those two (unlabelled) drives aren't your Windows 3.1 drives. Disk Management is showing two disk drives, a 500 GB and a 250 GB, neither of which (I assume) are your Windows 3.1 drives. That 55 MB EISA partition is a factory diagnostics partion, and the 3.3 GB FAT32 partition may be an OS recovery partition, both on your 500 GB boot drive.

Make sure that you've set the old (IDE, I assume) drive jumpers to MASTER (MASTER, SINGLE DRIVE if a Western Digital drive)) when putting them into a USB housing.

I don't know if I've ever put a Windows 3.1-era disk into a USB housing, but I'd expect it to read. It'd be FAT16 format.
 

montag451

Diamond Member
Dec 17, 2004
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RebateMonger is right,

The chances are that the drives are formatted in FAT16, which, I am pretty sure XP can't read.
What you could try is something like Acronis Disk Director that might be able to reformat the drives into FAT32 without losing data, or at least with the least risk of losing data.

Don't run Disk Manager or any other MS disk partitioning/formatting as you will definitely lose the data.

You might also be able to use RANISH, but I'm not sure - you would have to do your own research on that.
Please let us know the results.

 

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
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The chances are that the drives are formatted in FAT16, which, I am pretty sure XP can't read.

All recent versions of Windows can read every revision of FAT. If that wasn't the case then a lot of USB sticks and floppy disks wouldn't work either.
 

corkyg

Elite Member | Peripherals
Super Moderator
Mar 4, 2000
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Originally posted by: montag451
The chances are that the drives are formatted in FAT16, which, I am pretty sure XP can't read.

No, that is not correct. XP and Vista can read FAT and FAT 16 with no problem. Almost all flash memory devices are FAT 16.

 

essential

Senior member
Aug 28, 2004
403
2
91
Well, the system won't recognize the drives in any way. I even tried hooking them up internally and they stop the boot sequence on the computer. The drives are so old they don't have jumpers, and it seems like the computer is trying to boot off them.

Anyone have any other ideas how I could access them? If Windows can't see them at all, I can't think of any way to get the files from them.
 

RebateMonger

Elite Member
Dec 24, 2005
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Please supply the make and model of the two hard drives in question. Considering the time frame, I assume we are talking IDE drives in the 120 MegaByte to 2.1 GigaByte realm? I don't recall any IDE hard drives without Master/Slave jumpers.

It's also possible they are simply dead. I've had that happen with old (twelve-year-old) drives that worked last time I connected them, but died just sitting in a drawer.
 

essential

Senior member
Aug 28, 2004
403
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How can I tell that they are dead if they both power up? I have data recovery software and it crashes when I try to scan my machine with each of the HDs plugged in via the external USB, works fine when they aren't plugged in. Also, my dad said the drives are small, but he doesn't remember exactly how small. I can take pictures if needed. Yes they are both IDE.

The info I can read:
HD1: Maxtor
Model: 7213AT
HDA: 30A
PCBA: 65A
Unique: 56A

HD2: Maxtor
Model: LXT213A
TLA No: 9648304 4
Year: 1988
 

Iron Woode

Elite Member
Super Moderator
Oct 10, 1999
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Originally posted by: essential
How can I tell that they are dead if they both power up? I have data recovery software and it crashes when I try to scan my machine with each of the HDs plugged in via the external USB, works fine when they aren't plugged in. Also, my dad said the drives are small, but he doesn't remember exactly how small. I can take pictures if needed. Yes they are both IDE.

The info I can read:
HD1: Maxtor
Model: 7213AT
HDA: 30A
PCBA: 65A
Unique: 56A

HD2: Maxtor
Model: LXT213A
TLA No: 9648304 4
Year: 1988
jumper settings for Maxtor 7213At: http://www.driverforum.com/harddrive3/261.html

jumper settings for Maxtor LXT213A: http://www.4drives.com/DRIVESPECS/MAXTOR/2109.txt
 

essential

Senior member
Aug 28, 2004
403
2
91
That did the trick, the jumpers needed to be on slave, and hooked up directly to the motherboard, they wouldn't work at all in a external USB casing. I never saw the jumper settings because they were on the bottom of the drive. Since i've been working with computers they've always been on the back by the power/ide connections.

Thanks for the help.