External hard drive no longer recognised

My USB external hard-drive is no longer recognised in "My computer".
Unplugging, replugging does not give the usual "new hardware found -
installing driver" routine. Rebooting does nothing. I have tried
uninstalling all the USB root hub drivers without effect. As the disc is not
recognised, obviously its own driver does not show up in device manager.

I've googled around and realise that this is a major Vista bug - but I have
not been able to find any fix that works. Any other ideas please?

Ric

Try this fix http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=941600

"Ric" wrote:

> My USB external hard-drive is no longer recognised in "My computer".
> Unplugging, replugging does not give the usual "new hardware found -
> installing driver" routine. Rebooting does nothing. I have tried
> uninstalling all the USB root hub drivers without effect. As the disc is not
> recognised, obviously its own driver does not show up in device manager.
>
> I've googled around and realise that this is a major Vista bug - but I have
> not been able to find any fix that works. Any other ideas please?
>

Thanks but still no joy.

I think reinstalling XP may be the best solution - this USB bug in Vista
seems very persistent after some googling research...

First, you want to be sure your ext HDD is formatted NTFS, not FAT32. My ext
HDD occassionally is not recognized by Vista and I have to unplug the USB
cable, unplug the power on the HDD, then plug everything back in and turn on
the HDD and then it will recognize the ext HDD.

"Ric" wrote:

> My USB external hard-drive is no longer recognised in "My computer".
> Unplugging, replugging does not give the usual "new hardware found -
> installing driver" routine. Rebooting does nothing. I have tried
> uninstalling all the USB root hub drivers without effect. As the disc is not
> recognised, obviously its own driver does not show up in device manager.
>
> I've googled around and realise that this is a major Vista bug - but I have
> not been able to find any fix that works. Any other ideas please?
>