External hard drive problem

[greypoint]

Decided to search for some old pics on my small - 200gb - hard drive this afternoon. I have'nt used it for a few weeks after moving some photos off my old laptop prior to lending it to a friend. The hard drive turns on, shows a green light and whirrs a bit but neither my laptop or desktop recognise that it's connected. Does this mean it's failed? Help!

[picsfor]

Doesn't sound good i have to say.
The whirring is the platters spinning but the heads do not sound as though they are working.

Get some one else to try it on their computer (Mac  or PC) and if the same happens pop into PC World. They can do an on the spot test for you to see if it is recoverable (or if the data is recoverable) with a view to making money from data recovery or selling you a new hard drive!

[Oldboy]

Decided to search for some old pics on my small - 200gb - hard drive this afternoon. I have'nt used it for a few weeks after moving some photos off my old laptop prior to lending it to a friend. The hard drive turns on, shows a green light and whirrs a bit but neither my laptop or desktop recognise that it's connected. Does this mean it's failed? Help!

May not be a problem with the drive but could be Windows may think it's connected when it isn't. Now that might sound crazy but it's just the USB connections getting itself in a twist. Should have an icon on the Taskbar, bottom right hand side and when you hover over it, it should say 'Safely Remove Hardware'. Double click this Icon and a window will open showing the different things connected to the USB ports. Select the one for the hard drive and click on it, then click the stop button. Now unplug the hard drive from the USB port and plug it back in, and it should now see it.  

[greypoint]

Well - this is odd. I'd tried two different USB cables and two different PCs - switched on and off pushed and made sure all cables were connected but nothing happened. Just fired it up again to try the suggestions and it's now been recognised and is working. Think I'll get everything that's not already on DVD backed up just in case it happens again. Thanks anyway!

[Alfonso_Frisk]

Scan it for errors  and do a virus check on it

[greypoint]

good idea

[Oldboy]

Well - this is odd. I'd tried two different USB cables and two different PCs - switched on and off pushed and made sure all cables were connected but nothing happened. Just fired it up again to try the suggestions and it's now been recognised and is working. Think I'll get everything that's not already on DVD backed up just in case it happens again. Thanks anyway!

It happens like that now and again. Windows doesn't know the drive has been removed and thinks it's still connected, so you can't connect it again and it won't show in explorer. By reconnecting and disconnecting it notices it's been disconnected and the next time it's connected it sees the drive. To remove the drive when the computer is on you should use the safely removed hardware option whereas, when you switch the computer off and then remove the drive it doesn't cause the same problem. 

[greypoint]

I always do that with my main HD but this one had never been connected to either my current laptop or desktop - had'nt used it for a while.

[Oldboy]

I always do that with my main HD but this one had never been connected to either my current laptop or desktop - had'nt used it for a while.

Well that's my theory gone up in smoke then!   

[Colin]

If it is a while since it has been used and it is getting old then it may have been unable to spin up to speed and it needed a while with the power connected to get warm enough to spin up properly. IMHO the backing up of it to dvd would be a good move amd then run some low level diagnostics on the drive. You can download a cd full of great PC diagnostics from here.