# External Hard Drive not recognized by Windows XP



## gerling182 (Sep 25, 2007)

Hi there,

I have an Acer Aspire 5610 laptop. Windows died recently and if I use the Acer recovery program I will lose the contents of my hard drives - something I am very keen to avoid. So I got my hands on a Windows XP Pro CD and have installed Windows. The problem is now I cannot for the life of me get it to recognize my Maxtor USB external hard drive. My USB mouse works so the ports aren't dead. I've installed every little thing I can find on the Acer/Intel/Microsoft/Maxtor websites etc but still nothing. I've tried uninstalling the USB ports and reinstalling them - still nothing. I've checked device manager to see if it's recognized but not mapping correctly - it's not in device manager. I went into my BIOS to ensure that USB was enabled and it's not an option in the menu (I have PhoenixBIOS). I have tested the External Hard Drive on other PC's and it works fine. When I plug it into my notebook it plays the sound to say it's recognized a USB input and then the USB symbol displays in the Task Bar with the Message "Device Not Recognized" - what can I do to get this to work - I've spent 26 hours so far and nothing has worked and it would take me forever to back 120GB onto DVDs! Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!


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## manic (Aug 2, 2005)

Is sp2 installed?


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## gerling182 (Sep 25, 2007)

Yes, SP2 has been installed


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## manic (Aug 2, 2005)

Is there a way for you to install chipset drivers? When you reinstalled
windows it may have whacked that out.....


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## gerling182 (Sep 25, 2007)

manic said:


> Is there a way for you to install chipset drivers? When you reinstalled
> windows it may have whacked that out.....


Already done, went to the Intel site and downloaded the latest Chipset drivers - still nothing.


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## manic (Aug 2, 2005)

That is odd, and you checked bios for anything pertaining to enabling
usb2.0. Have you tried it in safe mode? Worth a shot. You said it 
worked in other pc's. If you have another pc you could hook the drive
up to that, then share on a network and dump files from laptop to
the drive that way.


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## gerling182 (Sep 25, 2007)

manic said:


> That is odd, and you checked bios for anything pertaining to enabling
> usb2.0. Have you tried it in safe mode? Worth a shot. You said it
> worked in other pc's. If you have another pc you could hook the drive
> up to that, then share on a network and dump files from laptop to
> the drive that way.



I've checked BIOS, but according to Phoenix it should live under Advanced - however there is no USB 2.0 under Advanced to enable or disable. I'd think that might be the problem - but the mouse works so I'm guessing it must be enabled.

Tried safe mode, didn't make a difference either.

How easy is it to network two laptops - I've never done it before?


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## manic (Aug 2, 2005)

Are you sure your not missing a sub menu in bios? When you high
light/or hit enter on some items it will open a sub menu giving you
more options. Your mouse is probably not usb2.0.


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## gerling182 (Sep 25, 2007)

manic said:


> Are you sure your not missing a sub menu in bios? When you high
> light/or hit enter on some items it will open a sub menu giving you
> more options. Your mouse is probably not usb2.0.


Definitely not missing a submenu, there is only one item in Advanced and it's got nothing to do with USB (you can't even select it).


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