Unreadable External hard disk

I have installed Vista and bought before that a western digital 500gb SATA
drive in an icy box sata case. Its been read in disk management as unreadable
and no option provided to do anything. in properties it says 'type : unknown
', 'status : unreadable', 'partition style : not applicable','capacity :
0mb'. PLEASE can you assist me in directing me to the problem and a solution
please????

Gate7cy:
If the hard drive is new, it has to be formatted before it will be
recognized. You should have that option in disk management. Have a great
day:

--
Dennis Pack
XP x64, Vista Enterprise x64
Office2007
"gate7cy" <gate7cy@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:E2DE468A-E372-4AC6-B16D-09EB6AF31EB8@microsoft.com...
>I have installed Vista and bought before that a western digital 500gb SATA
> drive in an icy box sata case. Its been read in disk management as
> unreadable
> and no option provided to do anything. in properties it says 'type :
> unknown
> ', 'status : unreadable', 'partition style : not applicable','capacity :
> 0mb'. PLEASE can you assist me in directing me to the problem and a
> solution
> please????

Hi,

Have you tried creating a partition on the drive yet?
Installed drivers for the motherboard to support it?

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

"gate7cy" <gate7cy@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:E2DE468A-E372-4AC6-B16D-09EB6AF31EB8@microsoft.com...
>I have installed Vista and bought before that a western digital 500gb SATA
> drive in an icy box sata case. Its been read in disk management as
> unreadable
> and no option provided to do anything. in properties it says 'type :
> unknown
> ', 'status : unreadable', 'partition style : not applicable','capacity :
> 0mb'. PLEASE can you assist me in directing me to the problem and a
> solution
> please????

Could be drivers. Go to your motherboard manufacturer's site and see if
they have Vista drivers for whatever chip they're using in the motherboard
for the SATA drives. If they don't have anything specifically for Vista,
find the specs for the motherboard on that site, figure out what the chipset
is that's running the SATA drive (make sure you find the chipset the SATA
drive is plugged into -- a lot of motherboards have two chipset (usually and
Intel version and something else)), go to the chipset manufacturer's home
page, and find Vista drivers for that chip. If you're not in a RAID
configuration, don't use the RAID drivers.

And, just for giggles, what motherboard are you using and which SATA port
are you plugged into?

Oh, also make sure you've got the drive set up as non-RAID in the BIOS
(assuming it's not actually part of a RAID configuration).



"gate7cy" <gate7cy@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:E2DE468A-E372-4AC6-B16D-09EB6AF31EB8@microsoft.com...
>I have installed Vista and bought before that a western digital 500gb SATA
> drive in an icy box sata case. Its been read in disk management as
> unreadable
> and no option provided to do anything. in properties it says 'type :
> unknown
> ', 'status : unreadable', 'partition style : not applicable','capacity :
> 0mb'. PLEASE can you assist me in directing me to the problem and a
> solution
> please????

Thanks for the fast reply. It seems that Western Digital do not have anything
yet to support Vista. The problem is there. So I reccomend stay away from WD
until they catch up.

ps. I am using a 2.16 intel dual core centrino

Gate7cy:
I have at least 12 WD hard drives that are all compatible with
Vista. Four of the hard drives are SATA, two SATA2 and the rest PATA. If the
hard drive is new and unformatted, "Disk Management" will see the hard drive
but Vista won't recognize the hard drive. For Vista to recognize the hard
drive it has to be formatted, partitioned (if desired) and a drive letter
assigned. If you can't format the hard drive in Vista, format it in XP.

--
Dennis Pack
XP x64, Vista Enterprise x64
Office2007
"gate7cy" <gate7cy@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:851ACA5C-4D4B-4BB4-B329-28006BCBB65C@microsoft.com...
> Thanks for the fast reply. It seems that Western Digital do not have
> anything
> yet to support Vista. The problem is there. So I reccomend stay away from
> WD
> until they catch up.
>
> ps. I am using a 2.16 intel dual core centrino

Apparantley my original post did not appear, so please forgive me if this
appears twice. I have a WD My Book Premium 500gb external hard drive. It
has been in use for a few months. When I upgraded to Ultimate, it originally
showed up under "My Computer" as a WD drive. It has no disappeared. The WD
Diagnostic and Back-Up programs appear to still work, I just can't access the
hard drive. WD does not have any VISTA drivers as of yet, but if I could
access and see the drive, I should be able to see it now?

Thanks for any help or suggestions,

Mike

"Dennis Pack" wrote:

> Gate7cy:
> I have at least 12 WD hard drives that are all compatible with
> Vista. Four of the hard drives are SATA, two SATA2 and the rest PATA. If the
> hard drive is new and unformatted, "Disk Management" will see the hard drive
> but Vista won't recognize the hard drive. For Vista to recognize the hard
> drive it has to be formatted, partitioned (if desired) and a drive letter
> assigned. If you can't format the hard drive in Vista, format it in XP.
>
> --
> Dennis Pack
> XP x64, Vista Enterprise x64
> Office2007
> "gate7cy" <gate7cy@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:851ACA5C-4D4B-4BB4-B329-28006BCBB65C@microsoft.com...
> > Thanks for the fast reply. It seems that Western Digital do not have
> > anything
> > yet to support Vista. The problem is there. So I reccomend stay away from
> > WD
> > until they catch up.
> >
> > ps. I am using a 2.16 intel dual core centrino
>

Mike:
I plugged in my WD external hard drive and Vista installed the
drivers, all three partitions are visible and accessible. I didn't install
the drivers or back-up software from the installation disk. Currently
Retrospect isn't compatible with Vista, but I still use it with XP x64. Go
into Disk management to see the partition setup on the external hard drive,
there may be a corruption in a partition causing it to be unreadable.

--
Dennis Pack
XP x64, Vista Enterprise x64
Office2007
"MKFMedic" <MKFMedic@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:AE7E98BB-2548-43A4-936B-C7DBC388DD06@microsoft.com...
> Apparantley my original post did not appear, so please forgive me if this
> appears twice. I have a WD My Book Premium 500gb external hard drive. It
> has been in use for a few months. When I upgraded to Ultimate, it
> originally
> showed up under "My Computer" as a WD drive. It has no disappeared. The
> WD
> Diagnostic and Back-Up programs appear to still work, I just can't access
> the
> hard drive. WD does not have any VISTA drivers as of yet, but if I could
> access and see the drive, I should be able to see it now?
>
> Thanks for any help or suggestions,
>
> Mike
>
> "Dennis Pack" wrote:
>
>> Gate7cy:
>> I have at least 12 WD hard drives that are all compatible with
>> Vista. Four of the hard drives are SATA, two SATA2 and the rest PATA. If
>> the
>> hard drive is new and unformatted, "Disk Management" will see the hard
>> drive
>> but Vista won't recognize the hard drive. For Vista to recognize the hard
>> drive it has to be formatted, partitioned (if desired) and a drive letter
>> assigned. If you can't format the hard drive in Vista, format it in XP.
>>
>> --
>> Dennis Pack
>> XP x64, Vista Enterprise x64
>> Office2007
>> "gate7cy" <gate7cy@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
>> news:851ACA5C-4D4B-4BB4-B329-28006BCBB65C@microsoft.com...
>> > Thanks for the fast reply. It seems that Western Digital do not have
>> > anything
>> > yet to support Vista. The problem is there. So I reccomend stay away
>> > from
>> > WD
>> > until they catch up.
>> >
>> > ps. I am using a 2.16 intel dual core centrino
>>

Dennis,

Thank you for the information. I followed your advice and although I cannot
get the original WD Hardrive symbol to register, I do have a local disk icon
and everything appears to be working.

It will be a fine fix until WD actually comes out with support.

Thanks again,

Mike

"Dennis Pack" wrote:

> Mike:
> I plugged in my WD external hard drive and Vista installed the
> drivers, all three partitions are visible and accessible. I didn't install
> the drivers or back-up software from the installation disk. Currently
> Retrospect isn't compatible with Vista, but I still use it with XP x64. Go
> into Disk management to see the partition setup on the external hard drive,
> there may be a corruption in a partition causing it to be unreadable.
>
> --
> Dennis Pack
> XP x64, Vista Enterprise x64
> Office2007
> "MKFMedic" <MKFMedic@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:AE7E98BB-2548-43A4-936B-C7DBC388DD06@microsoft.com...
> > Apparantley my original post did not appear, so please forgive me if this
> > appears twice. I have a WD My Book Premium 500gb external hard drive. It
> > has been in use for a few months. When I upgraded to Ultimate, it
> > originally
> > showed up under "My Computer" as a WD drive. It has no disappeared. The
> > WD
> > Diagnostic and Back-Up programs appear to still work, I just can't access
> > the
> > hard drive. WD does not have any VISTA drivers as of yet, but if I could
> > access and see the drive, I should be able to see it now?
> >
> > Thanks for any help or suggestions,
> >
> > Mike
> >
> > "Dennis Pack" wrote:
> >
> >> Gate7cy:
> >> I have at least 12 WD hard drives that are all compatible with
> >> Vista. Four of the hard drives are SATA, two SATA2 and the rest PATA. If
> >> the
> >> hard drive is new and unformatted, "Disk Management" will see the hard
> >> drive
> >> but Vista won't recognize the hard drive. For Vista to recognize the hard
> >> drive it has to be formatted, partitioned (if desired) and a drive letter
> >> assigned. If you can't format the hard drive in Vista, format it in XP.
> >>
> >> --
> >> Dennis Pack
> >> XP x64, Vista Enterprise x64
> >> Office2007
> >> "gate7cy" <gate7cy@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> >> news:851ACA5C-4D4B-4BB4-B329-28006BCBB65C@microsoft.com...
> >> > Thanks for the fast reply. It seems that Western Digital do not have
> >> > anything
> >> > yet to support Vista. The problem is there. So I reccomend stay away
> >> > from
> >> > WD
> >> > until they catch up.
> >> >
> >> > ps. I am using a 2.16 intel dual core centrino
> >>
>

I guess I have the same issue.
I have a SATA 300 Gb MAXTOR drive (internal) with a PCI SATA adaptor. The
drive has been formated with XP, and then used to store most of my data. Then
yesterday I upgrated to Vista (Premium), but SATA HD is now 'unreadeble'
according to Disc Management. I guess I should be able to format it, but I do
not want to do it now, as I could lose all my data.

The PCI card seems to work OK, with good driver. The disc is seen in Vista.
It is just 'unreadable' and I cannot acces the data.

MaxBlast (provided by Maxtor to check the disc) is not Vista compatible, and
there is nothin on Maxtor web regarding Vista.

Is there an issue with high capacitu previoulsly XP formated HD ?

I will try to mount it on a XP laptop, using enclosure, but I would prefere
to avoid to do it.

I somebody experienced the same issue ?

Thnaks



"gate7cy" wrote:

> I have installed Vista and bought before that a western digital 500gb SATA
> drive in an icy box sata case. Its been read in disk management as unreadable
> and no option provided to do anything. in properties it says 'type : unknown
> ', 'status : unreadable', 'partition style : not applicable','capacity :
> 0mb'. PLEASE can you assist me in directing me to the problem and a solution
> please????