USB Hard Drive Kit

[Chubasco]

I recently purchased a USB 2.0 Hard Drive kit, made by ADS Tech, in an attempt to retrieve data off of my desktop drive after the CMOS went out on the mother board.

So far I have not had much success. Below is a list of my experiences and info so far:
1. Cannot access the drive using my WinXP Pro desktop at work (see 3 and 4 below)
2. Could not confirm whether or not the Drivers actually installed, because the only executable that has a U.I. is the one for Win98 drivers only. The rest don't seem to do anything.
3. My system does get the nifty little notification that a high speed USB Mass Storage device is connected, but that it is not connected to a high speed port. Or something along these lines.
4. After powering on the drive, plugging in the USB cable, and then attempting to view the drive using my computer or explorer or Disk Management each of these programs basically freezes. Eventually, my entire system starts responding and multiple little dialoge boxes start popping up with the message "Shell_NotifyIcon Fail" and an OK button.
5. The activity light on the USB drive stays on constantly while the USB cord is plugged in.
6. The drive that I'm attempting to access does have Windows XP Pro installed on it.
7. The drive is a Maxtor and is set to Master.

Appreciate any advice anyone can provide.

My system specs are:
Windows XP Pro with SP1
P4 1.3MHz
512MB RAM
USB 1.1
Dell

 

[thorin]

Are you sure you connected the datacable in the enclosure properly (the red strip on the IDE cable should go towards pin1 on the drive).

Thorin

 

[BlueWeasel]

I've got an ADS USB 2.0 drive kit (with a 40gb WD drive) and it works fine for me in XP without having to install any drivers. I know that USB 2.0 is supposed to be backward compatible with 1.0/1.1, but could that be the problem?

 

[Chubasco]

Thanks for feedback so far.

The IDE cable seems to be plugged in correctly. In fact there is a notch where a missing pin is preventing it from plugging in any other way.

Also, to clarify:

- the "Shell_NotifyIcon Fail" boxes don't seem to start popping up until the system has successfully disconnected itself from the drive.

- the only place my system reckognizes the drive is in Disk Management where it is listed as "healthy". However, I am still unable to access it.

 

[Chubasco]

these boards move fast

 

[LTC8K6]

Xp should not need any drivers for this.

Try changing the drive's jumper around anyway. Make sure it is set to master or single.

It could be that P4 running at a measly 1.3Mhz.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Originally posted by: Chubasco
these boards move fast

Yep, welcome to the blur known as General Hardware.

I'm really not sure what the problem could be, though. Could it be possible there is a problem with the actual drive partition, or does it appear to be a hardware problem with the USB drive kit? If it's a partition error, then that makes it hard to try to recover the data.

Here's a bump for you, and welcome to AT.

 

[LTC8K6]

What size is the drive?

 

[Chubasco]

I've tried changing the jumpers to every configuration in the spec. Still no luck. Will test another drive to confirm whether or not it is the drive itself.........hope it's not.

The drive is only 40GB.

 

[thorin]

Actually putting the drive in a system and connecting it directly is a good move. Along the same lines you could put a known good drive in the enclosure and try it.

Thorin