External HD trouble

[TJ55]

A friend sent me a 1TB Seagate HD for me to fill with music and send back.

My original HD is also a Seagate and it works fine in either port and in any combination.

If I plug in the new HD by itself I can see it in the "My Computer" screen but when I plug in my original HD the new one disappears and I cannot open it to copy the files.

If the original is plugged in first and and then I plug in the new one it still doesn't show in the "My Computer" screen.

It always shows in the screen used to safely eject it. It always shows in the "Device and Storage" screen.

Anyone have any experience/suggestions here?

[Kwesi]

Did your friends drive come loaded with software? That crap can be murderous.

[TJ55]

Don't think so. It was completely blank and still in the box.

[TheSuzie]

Sounds like it may be a power problem. If the new drive draws too much power, your USB ports may not be able to handle it. Some of my drives require me to use a Y type cable or even to use a powered hub with an external supply in order for everything to be stable with multiple external drives.

Good Luck,
S

[Chunk-O-Funk]

Did you format the new drive?

[TJ55]

Sounds like it may be a power problem. If the new drive draws too much power, your USB ports may not be able to handle it. Some of my drives require me to use a Y type cable or even to use a powered hub with an external supply in order for everything to be stable with multiple external drives.

Good Luck,
S

This is an interesting theory. I have copied my drive to others before, but the destination drive has always been 500 GB or less. I guess a 1 TB drive would pull more power?

Did you format the new drive?

Yes.

[Infidelity]

I think I can answer this one..

Seagate have default drive letter and even if you change it/format it will still be the drive letter that your computer will recognize. That's why your computer won't recognize both at the same time.

Best way to do is just copy all the files from your other HD to your internal HD and transfer it..

I think a hard format would do the job I didn't try it due to laziness but it could be a potentially fix.

[MJ5150]

Plug both in and open Disk Management. If they are both using the same drive letter, pick the one from your friend and assign it a new drive letter. You'll get a scary warning from Windows about certain programs not functioning correctly if you change the drive letter, but you'll be fine. You can change the drive letter on yours too, but make sure you are indeed not running any programs from it.

-Mike

[Infidelity]

Originally Posted by MJ5150

Plug both in and open Disk Management. If they are both using the same drive letter, pick the one from your friend and assign it a new drive letter. You'll get a scary warning from Windows about certain programs not functioning correctly if you change the drive letter, but you'll be fine. You can change the drive letter on yours too, but make sure you are indeed not running any programs from it.

-Mike

Tried that with my 2 Seagate HD and it didn't work.. Changed the new HD from K: to J: and when plugged alone the computer recognized it as J and when plugged both it is both K. That's why I recommended a hard format.

Could work with OP's case but it didn't work for me..

[TJ55]

Plug both in and open Disk Management. If they are both using the same drive letter, pick the one from your friend and assign it a new drive letter. You'll get a scary warning from Windows about certain programs not functioning correctly if you change the drive letter, but you'll be fine. You can change the drive letter on yours too, but make sure you are indeed not running any programs from it.

-Mike

I'm not comfortable enough with my computer knowledge to start messing with stuff like this to honest. My computer savvy is just enough to download shows and organize them. Past that and I can easily see myself breaking it.

Best way to do is just copy all the files from your other HD to your internal HD and transfer it..

Yeah man I was afraid of that. It will take forever to transfer 300+GB twice.

Thanks for the help guys. I was dumbfounded. {see above where that doesn't take much}

[Sonic_Death]

Changing the drive letter is very simple, so don't be afraid of it. What operating system do you have? I will gladly give you step by step instructions if you wish.

My original though was the drive letter issue as well, although Suzie may be right with the power trouble. I've seen people trying to power thumb drives and externals through usb hubs and causing all USB connections to fail. If you have a desktop and plugging straight in, I am less inclined to think it is that though.

Some alternative options I can think of are if you have networked computers in your household, you can always have them plugged into separate shared computers.

EDIT:

To get to Disk Management: (Assuming you have Windows XP or 7), go to Start > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management. From there you should see Disk Management on the left, click it.

I researched a little and a fix may be possible when you have both drives plugged in. In Disk Management you'll see both drives there, but one will presumably be offline. You should have the option to bring this drive online, probably by right clicking and I think you'll get something like "Reactivate Disk". It depends on your OS, so let me know. After you bring it online, it should be assigned a new drive letter automatically and should hopefully work as well.

[TJ55]

Originally Posted by Sonic_Death

Changing the drive letter is very simple, so don't be afraid of it. What operating system do you have? I will gladly give you step by step instructions if you wish.

My original though was the drive letter issue as well, although Suzie may be right with the power trouble. I've seen people trying to power thumb drives and externals through usb hubs and causing all USB connections to fail. If you have a desktop and plugging straight in, I am less inclined to think it is that though.

Some alternative options I can think of are if you have networked computers in your household, you can always have them plugged into separate shared computers.

Yeah, I'd appreciate that. I'm running Windows 7.

I'm working on a laptop that is plugged in directly. I get no kind of warning or anything that too much power is being drawn from the USB port. I read a few places that that may occur.

No such luck on the networked computers. Just me and my laptop.

[Sonic_Death]

To make it simpler, in Windows 7 if you hit start and type "diskmgmt.msc" into the search there, you'll get Disk Management. I recommend you try the steps I outlined above.

[TJ55]

Disk Management says "Disk is offline because there is a signature collision with another disk that is online"

[TJ55]

Right click and "online" did the trick. Thank you. I really do appreciate it. My buddy does too.

[Sonic_Death]

Glad to help my friend! I find it strange that Seagate lets this problem continue.