Windows 7: External Hard Drives

I have two external hard drives which i store and run stuff from.... This has never been a problem while running xp.

I've been sitting on this problem for a while looking for a solution or waiting untill i have seen someone else with a similar problem in hope that there will be a fix. So far, no luck.

The Problem:

This is pretty hard to explain as the problem is pretty random.... From boot up sometimes none or one of my hard drives show up. Mostly they both appear.
Upon Windows startup Sometimes only one external hard drive will appear, then about 10 mins later windows will try to autorun the other as soon as it is eventually recognised.
Sometimes they're no problem untill you try to move large files from one drive to another or from one drive to my hard drive. It will start to move them and then freeze half way through claiming that the files dont exist. You then go to explorer to look, the drives are showing and so is every folder but the folders show as empty.
Both hard drives lights are off indicating they are off.
The only way to fix it is a system restart.

One is a maxtor basics 500gig and the other is a Seagate 1tb. I am running the trial version of windows 7.

I have played with the power manegement and nothing has been told to be switched off..... this hasn't helped.
I've tried unplugging, changing cables, exorcism..... none has affected it.

The only solution a can imagine now is reverting back to xp and cancelling my order for windows 7.

Please tell me there is something blatently obvious that i have missed.


Thank you.

P

hi and welcome to sevenforums

Are they both USB?

Thank you for the fast reply.

Yes they are both usb, not running off a hub and they both have their own power supply.

could you please fill out your system specs by clicking here?

P

Great. lets go into device manager and make sure the USB is working. type device manager in search, and go to the usb section. it should look like ethe screenshot with not unknown devices (they have yellow triangles on them).

If there are any unknown devices let us know.

Ken

ok I have quickly filled in a few specs but i'll have to do the rest tomorrow.

@ zigzag, there are no unknown devices. I have updated all of my drivers as well. Even when the drives stop responding they still show on my device manager.

Then time to check to see if USB is being halted / not initialized. Are the drives on when you power up Windows? If so, power them off, power up Windows, then power up the drives.

Also, check to see if your BIOS has enabled legacy USB detection - if so, turn it off and see if it makes a difference.

Finally, check the power settings for all your USB ports to see if Windows is auto shutting them down - if so, try disabling that 'feature' and seeing if that works.

Rightho.......... The drives do power up on startup so i turned them off then started windows. Wow that was a painfull 30 minutes when i switched them on. The maxtor didn't startup but the seagate was instantly recognised, however when i tried to access it windows explorer stopped responding.

I have now disabled legacy detection, both drives (if i leave them on) show in explorer with no delay now, so i think thats one part of the problem solved. thanks for that. The large file transfer problem still remains, both of the hard drive lights go out, even the one i wasn't using.
That also caused pretty much everything to stop responding and i had to do a forced restart...... but then windows froze in the 'shutting down' screen.


I am debating on fetching a hammer from the shed.



Edit: Oh yeah i switched everytthing to 'never shut down' in the advanced power manegement settings yesterday.

Good news everyone: The hammer worked!

j/k

Anyway i have solved the problem and as i anticipated it was blatently obvious..... in fact i'm almost too embarrassed to reveal the solution.
I discovered that my bios is about 3 versions out of date. One simple update later and i have this cursed machine doing exactly what i want it to do again.

Thank you all for your help!

Glad to hear that you got it sorted.