USB Device Not Recognized (External Hard Drive)

[krudb3r 0]

Thank you. Sorry.

[Spyros7 0]

What WD says may sound believeable, but it is a load of c**p!!I have an 80gb passport that has been used continuously without any problems on 3 different desktop pcs, a laptop and a standalone DVD player with a USB port for almost 11 months. However, 10 days ago, I pluged it in my desktop pc USB port and I got the "unrecognized USB device" error message. After that all the above devices (including the DVD player) would completely ignore it, although the blue led would light up when connected. I was still within warranty so I took it to the local dealer of WD and a few days later I went back certain that it would be replaced but to my surprise, they told me that no problem was found. I asked them to see for myself and the technician connected it to his computer, through a USB hub using my cable and the drive would show up fine (making me look like a newb ). Seriously pissed off, I went back to test the drive on 2 of the computers mentioned above, only to find that the drive was not recognized at all !! I tried then to connect it directly to the USB ports and not through the USB extension cables THAT I HAVE BEEN USING ALL THIS TIME WITHOUT ANY PROBLEMS and guess what.. I could see the drive just fine !! I really don't know what conclusions to draw from this, besides the fact that I'm never going to buy a WD external harddrive ever again!!

[eightdigitword 0]

i had the same issues, worked for months on various computers using different cables. worked yesterday before i left the house came back to find it had decided not to work, nothing had changed. same cable, same system, no movement, no updates and yet it packed in on its own. tried all sorts of updates on usb power allocation, striped the unit down and checked the pcb, full works. almost gave up until i spotted an overlooked post on this forum of a fix using the short usb cable the unit was supplied with. now it works (dont ask). If you haven't tried this already then give it a bash. From what i can gather this is most likely a cable only issue, possibly a completely random uncontrollable malfunction, fingers crossed in the future.

 

as spyros7 stated might be better to aviod WD external (specifically usb powered) hard drives.

 

 

[jaywannahelp 0]

Hi all,

 

I had exactly the problem with WD passport 300GB after I'd changed from FAT32 to NTSF.

No solutions provided here solved my problem.

But my WD is back and running great and here is how.

 

go to control panel - adm. tools - services

 

Scroll down to find WD Drive Manager Service

 

Look at 'Startup Type' in the middle to see if its "Disabled"

 

If it is, turn it back to "Automatic"

 

Then the buttons under 'Service status' will be activated.

 

Press 'Start'

 

And then 'Apply'.

 

Disconnect your ext. HD from USB port and reconnect.

 

Magically there I saw the lights back on and device recognized.

 

I hope this will help for those who r biting nails with fear of losing precious data.

[RicLea 0]

Hi, i spent a good few hours trying to sort out the usb device not recognized problem, and none of the all over the forum fixed worked for me, as all trace of the device just disapeared.

This worked for for iomega 500gb external, gave it a go because my warranty seals were already broken.

 

So yea, tried all the sensible options, replugging everything, device managering like a mother-bit ch, my computer . management etc.

So then i took out all the casing screws to give it a look. If you do this, i fond that pulling out the usb adapter card on the inside leaves you with, in my case, a nice internal sata drive, which when put in internally, works totally fine.

Yea, you no onger have the externalosity, but at least you have all your data...and dont have to take a shit load of copywritten/confidential material to a shop for a fix.

 

Hope this helps someone

 

Ric

[andywoo 0]

Hi. I would just like to say that this is probably one of the most useful threads for tis problem that I have found, and I think it has helped me solve my 'usb device not recognized' issue.

 

I have a Western Digital 250gb hard drive which has served me very well for a year up until a few day ago. I started getting the 'usb device not recognized' malfunction error. After reading serveral posts I decided it was a power issue (although the error did not specifically say so), and decided to buy a USB booster cable (usb lead with 2 usb heads for twice the power).

 

I was going to order a Lindy cable off amazon (http://www.amazon.co.uk/LINDY-USB-Cable-Dual-Power/dp/B000FKP7XK) but the one and only reviewer of the product, it seemed, had exactly the same problem as me and upon trying the cable found it did not work. He instead advised to buy a usb powered hub, which I did.

 

I received the hub today, tryed it, and guess what, didn't work. That's when I searched and found this thread. I have been using the usb cable supplied with the hard drive. Some people in this thread seemded to have been using a different cable, got the error, tryed the orignal supplied WD cable, and the HD has magically worked.

 

I on the other hand, like a few other people in this thread, have been using the supplied WD usb cable from the start. I decided, after reading this thread, to try a different cable. I managed to find a usb cable of the same sort that came with my brother's Sony mp3 player, have just tryed it, and Eureka!

 

So I kinda wish I'd bought the Lindy two head usb adaptor after all, as it was a lot cheaper than the hub I don't even need.

 

So my advice it to try a diffrent cable, maybe even the Lindy one, or maybe a hub would work for you?

 

Who knows.

 

I think people saying that you need a new HD and that the data has gone is rubbish. The data must still be on there, after all nothing has happened to it. I think it's just easier for Western Digital support to say 'you need a new hd' than it is to troubleshoot.

 

I was considering opening the casing up and just retrieving the hard drive and giving it to someone who would know how to re-case it. If it goes again maybe I will have to. For the time being though it seems to be ok. And I hope everyone else manages to fix theirs.

[laptop 0]

yeehhhaaaaa....... thanks to the person who said "use the shorter cable that comes with the Western Digital drive". IT WORKS!!

 

Symptom: Blue LED turns on, drive just clicks but does not spin, laptop says "USB device not recognized". Picked it up and shook it, drive spins but still USB Device not recognized. It was connected with a 4 feet USB cable. But it works on my office laptop. Puzzled I seek Google's help (as usual), end up in this forum and then use the smaller (6 inches) cable and boom, the WD 160 GB is recognized right away.

 

Thanks once again.

Surprized though, the 2006 solution works in 2009 also!! WD learn something plzzzzzzzzzz.

[samsungsinger 0]

Andromeda9's solution of using the original USB cord that WD sends you worked for me. Thanks Andromeda9!

[suzyhurrry 0]

Hi. My 160GB WD Passport also suddenly quit working over the weekend. It had previously worked on both my home machine and my Dell laptop, and now is not recognized on either these machines, or any of the others I've tried.

 

Unfortunately, I have tried the vast majority of these solutions. I am using the original cable; I tried using other cables, including a similar short one from someone else’s USB device that looked like the one that came with my HD; tried using other computers; tried downloading a driver (for which I could find none); tried going through disk manager and device manager and admin tools/services (as suggested by jaywannahelp in Oct...WD is not even listed); tried plugging it into every single USB port on the laptop and the computer both front/back and I even tried the one in the docking station; tried laying the drive on its side, upside down, and vertically; tried giggling the connections and wire…

 

Only solutions not tried, taking the case apart and plugging the hard drive directly into the motherboard, using a USB-powered hub or a USB booster cable, plugging it into a machine running Vista or Linux or into a Mac, and lastly, taking it to a computer shop and begging for help.

 

The drive does not click, the blue light is on, and it appears to be functional. It is just not being recognized.

 

Anyway...I have to stop at Best Buy later tonight to pick up the booster cable and hub to attempt those, and I'm trying to locate a friend with Vista, Linux, or a Mac.

 

Other than that...I'm out of ideas.

 

Glad to hear that others have at least had some success!

 

[edrivera1970 0]

I own a 60GB Passport and had the same problem. My computer would not recognize my Passport drive and other devices.

 

After trying several computers, cables, usb ports I finally ordered an Ultra USB 2.0 all in 1 card reader/usb hub.

 

In my opinion the problem with the Passport is that its voltage requirement is on the high end of what a regular usb port can provide.

 

Mine would work intermitently, depending on how many devices I had plugged into my usb bus.

 

By purchasing a USB hub that has its own power supply I finally got consistent performance out of my Passport.

[TDFlash 0]

I have to say that my WD ext. hard drive JUST did this to me this morning. I about had a heart attack! I tried two computers, nothing. It powers up, but isnt recognized and nothing popped up to say it was recognized on either computer.

 

Come to find out, it was the cable. I had the wrong cable. Same type of plug, the light on the hard drive works, but nothing would open. I found another cable that worked. After reading all these replies, I am now backing up my HD to another hard drive and DVD's/CD's.

 

Good luck to you all that may have problems. Back up! That is my suggestion. Always back up!

[SIMS2FIXER! 0]

Try it in a different USB slot it works for me as my belkin adapter is set to a certain USB slot if i plug it into a different 1 it wont recognise

[dacke 0]

Interesting how many different ways this device can cause problems. In my case, my 250G passport was not accessible after the first time I used it. It appeared in the Disk Manager (as active) but had no drive letter and I could not assign one to it (the error message said it was inactive).

 

It turned out that it somehow was associated with something called a "general volume" (generic? my system is in Swedish...) which was inactivated but appeared in the Device Manager. When I activated that, my Passport suddenly acquired a drive letter and could be accessed.

 

This "general volume" seems to be the same that sometimes appears when using the Safe Removal feature (and it cannot be stopped...). I have now changed the setting for the Passport so that it does not use a cache and can be removed without using Safe Removal. And so far no problems.

[satpal 0]

hello evryone

plz solve my prob

i bought a kingston pen drive (2gb) in this nov..

bt now my pz is not recognizing it

plz help me out

[no one 0]

Had similar problem with my Passport 350gb

 

read this and noticed someone posted Western Digitals recommendations.

 

"Cause:

There may not be enough power currently supplied to the machine's USB port. Most computer systems only supply 500mA of power through USB ports. The WD Passport hard drive requires a little over 1000mA of power at spin up."

 

 

Turns out I used a different USB cable second time I plugged it in. Went and got my original cable and worked fine. Other cable was obviously thinner and not as powerful. Good to note, hope others learn from this too.

[Barryt 0]

Hi,

 

Many thanks to Richie66 for his post.

 

Western Digital drives can be a pain in the neck - my two externals just vanished and became 'Unknown Devices' to Vista.

 

After searching here I put them on their sides, replugged them and hey presto - there they were! A bit of switch cleaner in the sockets and they now seem fine again.

 

I had a My Book World which was such a pain I ended up taking the hard drive out and installing it internally.

 

Time WD got their act together!

 

Cheers,

 

Barryt

[Kurttb1 0]

Well everyone I have been fighting with my WD Dual-Option External USB Harddrive for ye...ars that is since about 2006 I bought it in 2005 so it did work until just after the one year warantee. Low and behold I am obsessed with finding the problem of this thing. I took the cable out of my printer and stuck the cable from the HD into the printer to see if the cable and the USB was working -which they were so I decided to try the "Richie2066 Method" that is I turned my Hard-drive to where it would lay flat (wd readable up)

it didn't work so I turned it over to the other side upside down and it didn't work (now it's plugged in this whole time) and then I turned it back over and laid it flat so I could get the hammer to it. And what.da.ya.know the three bongs sounded and WD Button mangager appeared and Wow the unit is now working for the first time in 3 months. Don't know how long it will last but we will see. I think maybe it might have to do with the docking of the Hard Drive's scan. Maybe it was stuck and I popped it back in, anyway now all I have to do is find out where I can get a copy of the original software to reload the Dantz Retrospect for WD & the WD button manager, both of these need to be reinstalled on this new internal HD. I've heard of a lot of things Richie but this one needs to be in the List of Weird computer fixes. Hey you think this calls for a class action suit for a recall and replacement of all of our WD Ext HDrives

[dpjgen 0]

I was having the same issue with my WD ext drive. Drove me crazy. Then I took a second look at my USB cord. I was using the wrong one. It was a very thin cable. I found another one, probably the original, which was thicker. Plug it in and it worked. So, make sure you have the correct USB cable. I assume that different ones have different power or something like that.

 

DJ

[ruky 0]

wassup all...

 

my first time ever posting on any forum...i'm doing this cause i got a lot of good info from this site that helped me out quite a bit...

so i had the same "usb device not recognized" error, shortly after i tried to use a 4 port usb hub...that screwed everything up...

anyways i read instructions posted on this site by ross_aveling it was a good effort but it worked only half way...

i did restart my system in safe mode and take out the usb devices in device manager and add/remove programs...but that alone didn't help....but when i SYSTEM RESTORED to a date before i used the crummy 4 port USB hub and then switched back to normal mode....it corrected itself....hope this helps....i'm not very IT help inclined but i really hope this helps someone who was feeling like smashing a few things like i did when this happened...

[danamoonbeam 0]

After having the same problems that most of you are having with my WD 1TB external hard drive, I uninstalled the unknown device and started over. I disconnected all usb devices and attempted to plug in my usb from the external hd to one of the two rear usb ports. did not work. I once again uninstalled the unknown device and attempted to plug it in to one of the two usb ports on the front of my machine and it worked. I am assuming it is a power issue through the usb. Once I get it to load then plug in all other usb devices it works fine but if i try to restart or attempt to plug in my external hdd while other usb devices are connected it will not work properly and will be recognized as an unknown device.

 

Just FYI hope this helps someone.

 

PT

[kosimov 0]

Since there are so many problems apparently with the WD cable/HD arrangements, I thought I would throw in my $0.02 worth.

 

Before I went to college for my engineering degree, I worked repairing audio equipment, as well as lots of other types of equipment. After the degree and a few disappointing jobs, I formed my own company built products for computers, eventually "specializing" in laptops.

 

Some of the products also used cables, though USB came along late in the history of my company. However, we did have similar problems with cables AFTER they had either been used for a long time, or, somehow bent or twisted or otherwise "stressed". We found that even new cables could be rendered defective by even slight "stretching" caused by normal use.

 

One of the problems was that the cables were not always soldered to the connectors. Whenever possible, the cable manufacturers crimped connections to connector pins and shells, which saved them a lot of money and, consequently, allowed us to buy cords which did not cost more than the products (such as the current farcical "Monster" cables do). Unfortunately, the metals used in the connectors and the wires in the cables were not always compatible, and we had regular problems with the cables, very much like those reported here.

 

After switching to high quality connectors and building some of the cables ourselves, the problems more or less went away for a while. However, they eventually returned, and we discovered that the stranded wires used in the cables, which is a number of very thin solid wires twisted together, to allow the cables to flex, the stranded wires were literally wearing out. As the thin wires would break one by one, the resistance of the cables would go up, until finally the cables were either open (due to all the wires breaking) or intermittant (as the ends of the wires touched and pulled apart) or had high impedance as the signal and power currents were carried by smaller and smaller amounts of wire.

 

I would not be surprised if the problems reported here are due to a similar effect on the cables used with the USB drives. In some cases, the one amp of current required to START the drive, when carried by a cable which has increased its resistance to just one ohm or more, will cause the loss of one volt or more of voltage delivered to the drive, which is enough of a loss to prevent the drive from starting up. As the resistance increases in the cables, the drive may not work at all, as the logic circuits inside are sensitive to power supply voltage also.

 

Since virtually all manufacturers, such as WD, purchase cable assemblies from companies which specialize in making them in large quantities, I'd suspect that WD either got a warehouse full of low quality cables, or, that their drives require too much power when starting up. I wonder if a large value capacitor connected across the power and ground connections of the USB port(s) would supply enough "surge" power to start the drives up, even though the USB specification for USB 2.0 says that a device may draw no more than 500 mA from the USB connector, since the capacitor would charge up fairly quickly, probably before the drive tried to power up, and would supply a temporary surge of power for a fraction of a second during drive startup, then simply sit idle during ongoing operation of the drive, etc. Perhaps that is too technical but that is what I intend to try if I ever have this problem. I probably have seen the problem without realizing it, as I have had trouble with my "generic" USB drives from time to time....

 

Perhaps this will help work out what is causing this problem. If it is too "techie", just ignore it.

 

regards,

Larry

[maramot 0]

Thanks a great bunch Larry. My external HDD stopped functioning today right while I was browsing the net without any apparent reason. No matter where and how many times I reconnected the USB cable and how many times I uninstalled the unknown device, it just wouldn't work. I was worried that the HDD had failed. After reading your post I reconnected the power cable and it works just fine now Maybe the electricity power went a bit lower at some point since it's been raining heavily all day today...

[bdavenport 0]

Did a quick google search after my WD 1TB Hard drive crapped out, doing what you all have mentioned. I was freaking out that I would be up a creek. Tried your suggestions of fidling with the cables and it worked great! Thanks a ton for the help. Much appreciated.

[inciong008 0]

hi just want to share my experience about this..i have my flash drive 1gb that I THINK that is broken coz my computer said THE USB CANNOT BE RECOGNIZED..i didnt used it in about 2 years (i bought it when i was in collage,im an IT) then i read about this post and try to fix my flash drive

again to solved the mystery of this problem thing..you know what i found out?..the computer cant recognize the flash drive because of POWER that supply into it..yup thats the problem..and after i 100% recover my flash rive and working again i just found out that it has a lot of virus namely: win32/mabazet.A virus , win32/alban.NAB virus ,win32/SALITY.NAR virus , VBS/AUTORUN.CM WORM and more .. as you can see it the virus controll the win32 of the computers system thats why it didnt recognize it and i THINK it holds back the power supply that he needed..

 

so how did i do it?..

 

SIMPLE steps..i go to disk manager then at universal bus controller i unistall all my usb root hub 1 by 1 also with the standard universal PCI to USB Host Controller,then at the ACTION tab above it i SCAN Hardware change (note* your usb or flash drive must be inserted to the port so the computer can scan for your drive) then viola,problem solved!! then i opened my 2yrs old granny flash drive with nod32 then all of the items inside found many viruses..dang!!!

 

my conclusion is this 1.)Power of the usb port may be to high for the flash drive thats why you need to uninstall all drive then scan for it 2.)the power of the viruses

 

i hope this really help guys..email me or bump this thread if you need for more information about what i did..im cloning my hardisk right now and i just try to solve my flash drive problem for past time coz i read this thread..

 

I HOPE THIS HELP (im using Transcend JF v33 1gb my OS is windows xp sp2)

[mominisrael 0]

I got this error after a year with almost no problems. Switching the cable did not work. I turned the drive around, shook it, and rapped on it a few times. At first I thought I killed it, but it is now working just fine. Thank you!