External USB Hard Drive Not recongized anymore

I have not updated anything in my computer in 2 weeks (12/5/07 was the last
Windows Update I did). Today I just noticed that my "H" drive which is an
external Maxtor USB HDD is no longer being "read" like an NTFS disk.

This disk had data on it before and was formatted as an NTFS disk; however,
currently it says it can't read it, and if I connect it, it asks me if I want
to format the disk.

Is there a way to override this feature and tell Vista that it's really an
NTFS disk? At least temporarily so I can get my files off of it, then format
it so Vista likes it, then put files back on?

I'm running Windows Vista Ultimate x64.

Anyone? Any ideas?

"Brett" wrote:

> I have not updated anything in my computer in 2 weeks (12/5/07 was the last
> Windows Update I did). Today I just noticed that my "H" drive which is an
> external Maxtor USB HDD is no longer being "read" like an NTFS disk.
>
> This disk had data on it before and was formatted as an NTFS disk; however,
> currently it says it can't read it, and if I connect it, it asks me if I want
> to format the disk.
>
> Is there a way to override this feature and tell Vista that it's really an
> NTFS disk? At least temporarily so I can get my files off of it, then format
> it so Vista likes it, then put files back on?
>
> I'm running Windows Vista Ultimate x64.