eSATA problem Windows 7 x64

I'm having a problem with a Seagate GoFlex 1.5TB hard drive not working on win 7 x64. I'm using the eSATA/USB adapter with an eSATAp to eSATA and USB cable along with an IOGEAR GICe711S3 Pci controller card. (All drivers are updated.) The drive is viewable in disk management, but when I go to look at the properties, it gives me an error saying to refresh disk management. I have but it doesn't do anything. It has not been assigned a drive letter.

Please, any help would be appreciated.

A screenshot of Disk Management would be helpful, but in place of that, the primary questions:

Have you created partitions on the disk?

Have you formatted the created partitions?

James

@essenbe (1st post) Disk management says that the drive is online but I cannot assign a drive letter to it. Here is a screenshot for your reference. [Link]

@James Colbert No, I have not created a partition on the hard drive. It is running the original partition from the factory. Do you think I should do a reformat? I have already put stuff on it; so this would be a pain in the a**. I think that it is a problem with Windows not recognizing a eSATA drive over 1TB. (Btw I am running Win 7 Home Premium x64 without SP1.) Here is the screenshot you asked for. [Link]

@essenbe (2nd post) I have not yet trying the program. I don't know if it would help in my situation. I am using the eSATA adapter but have put stuff on it using the USB 3.0 adapter that came with the drive. I have search Google looking for plug n play for eSATA, but since I am using a third party card, it doesn't seem to work.

smithsunknown said:

@essenbe (1st post) Disk management says that the drive is online but I cannot assign a drive letter to it. Here is a screenshot for your reference. [Link]

If you right-click on the cross-hatched space of the drive, do you have a "FORMAT" item not grayed out that you can select?

If so, select it and choose "NTFS" and follow the wizard. That should probably do the trick and get a drive letter assigned.


Alternatively, have you tried Partition Wizard... either standalone boot CD or using the installed program under Win7. PW should have no problem dealing with this drive, and also being able to "format" it to NTFS, or of necessary being able to "delete all partitions" and then you can "create partition" and format to NTFS, etc.

Partition Wizard can be used to do anything Diskmgmt can do, and more. It also has a standalone boot CD which can be used for more significant drive/partition work... involving the OS's C-partition... which cannot be completed while actually running under Windows but which must be done at re-boot time (or using the standalone boot CD for PW).

You can get [free] Partition Wizard Home Edition v5.2 from here.

You can download the ISO for the standalone boot CD from here, and then use something like [free] IMGBURN (which you can get from here) to burn the ISO to CD.


Anyway, I think FORMAT TO NTFS may solve your problem. It may currently be formatted as HFS if the drive was initially intended to be used as an external drive for a Mac by the manufacturer, rather than Windows.

Re-formatting to NTFS is a required pre-step before being able to use such a drive on Windows.

smithsunknown said:

@James Colbert No, I have not created a partition on the hard drive. It is running the original partition from the factory. Do you think I should do a reformat? I have already put stuff on it; so this would be a pain in the a**. I think that it is a problem with Windows not recognizing a eSATA drive over 1TB. (Btw I am running Win 7 Home Premium x64 without SP1.)


@essenbe (2nd post) I have not yet trying the program. I don't know if it would help in my situation. I am using the eSATA adapter but have put stuff on it using the USB 3.0 adapter that came with the drive. I have search Google looking for plug n play for eSATA, but since I am using a third party card, it doesn't seem to work.

So, just for clarity, you are able to see and use the drive on this system when connected via USB, but not esata?

In order to use esata for hot-swapping, you must be running in AHCI mode. If you restart the system with the drive connected via esata, does it then show up? If it does, this is the problem.

Here is a tutorial on enabling AHCI mode. You can also google for more information. In order to use AHCI mode in an existing Win7 install, changes to the bios and registry are required. Be sure you carefully read through the instructions in the tutorial before attempting:

AHCI : Enable in Windows 7 / Vista

Also, although the process should not cause you to lose data, I highly recommend you connect the drive back via USB and copy any data you want to keep onto another drive.

Let us know if this is your issue.

James

@nitroman84 I have just a straight up eSATA card without a USB port. I bought this cable [Link] to connect the eSATA portion to the PCI card and the USB to an extra USB port. I have them both connected at the same time because they are in the back of my computer. Do you suggest that I leave the USB unplugged when I start up the computer and then plug it in after I am in Windows?

The adapter from Seagate is Powered eSATA. This means that it has both eSATA connections and USB connections. The eSATA is for data transfer while the USB is for the 5V power so the drive doesn't need an external power source.

@dsperber The format option is not greyed out so I could do this but there is already stuff on the drive. This would probably be a last resort option. Also, the drive is formatted from the factory as NTFS (for Windows). This isn't the Mac version (no HFS).

@James Colbert Yes, I see the drive when it is connected by USB but not eSATA. Also, I have tried running my computer in ACHI mode, but I saw no difference in whether I could see the drive or not.