Replacing the drive for an External HD

[rorz]

Hey guys, today i tripped over my friends external hard drive (HP md 1000h) and the drive subsequently failed (it would no longer be recognised even when i removed it from the enclosure and plugged it in through direct SATA on my PC)

So i went out and purchased another hard drive exactly the same as the one that was in there (Western Digital 1TB) but i got a 64mb cache instead of 32mb.

The problem is, the new hard drive is not recognised properly via USB, however is through sata. When plugging it in via usb it is recognised in the device manager but i cannot use it or see it. Additionally, when i go to 'Manage disks' it says i have to initialize the disk but then it does not let me saying 'the media is write protected'. i have formatted it using SATA as NTFS (and tried fat32) but to no avail.

I realise this is a hard one, maybe has something to do with the sata-usb controller?

Thanks

[Speedy Gonzales]

Was the HP md 1000h SATA 2? If it was, what's the WD 1 TB?? SATA 2, or 3? It sounds like it maybe SATA 3, since its got 64 mb cache. If its SATA 3, does the SATA port/s you plugged it into support SATA 3?

[rorz]

Thank you for the reply. The new drive is SATA II.

An update: When plugged in via sata it's fine

When plugged in using USB it is not. Device manager asks me to intialize it again which is wierd becuase i already had when it was in SATA. It then says cannot initialise due to media being write protected

[Speedy Gonzales]

Whats the model of the new hdd?

And what version of windows is it?? Does the external case have some kind of switch on it, to make it write protect ? If you're using Vista x64, it looks like some of WD's external hdds, aren't compatible with Vista x64

[rorz]

The HD is Western Digital Caviar Green 1TB. It is absolutely identical to the original hard drive the HP external had except its 64mb cache. I'm using Windows 7. The previous drive worked fine before it crashed. Has no switch on the case for write protection. Cheers.

[Speedy Gonzales]

Try this

Start | All Programs | Accessories | Command Prompt

At the flashing cursor type the following:

diskpart (hit <enter>)

Now select the external disk

Now type the following

Attributes volume clear readonly (hit <enter>)

[gcarmich]

Its a 4k cluster drive and lots of older USB controllers have problems with them. If you can take it back and get the 32MB cache drive it should then work.

[Speedy Gonzales]

There is a hotfix for 4k for Windows 7. KB982018. I've got it for x64, but it looks like its been removed

[gcarmich]

The USB controller also has to work with it.

Other thing it could be in this case is a damaged USB controller, may have happened at the same time as the drive was killed.

[rorz]

Thanks for the replies so far i appreciate it,

When i use Diskpart i can see it under 'LIST DISK' then i select it going 'SELECT DISK 2' it then says 'Disk 2 is selected' i then typed out that command about the readonly and it say's 'No disk is selected'? ! But it most definatly is selected...