General Technology & Troubleshooting Topics

[#1]

Do you only post here or do you manage your own web site ?  I like to keep up on things & don't always know if what I read is all that correct.  And no I haven't googled you.

[#2]

No problem with the name. Forget it.

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SMART Failure predicted on Hard Disk 0:  TOSHIBA MK4018GAS-(PM) WARNING:  Immediately back-up your data and replace your hard disk drive.  A failure may be imminent.

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That should not interfere with recognizing the external drive.

Two possibilities are jumpering it to slave (from master) and trying another enclosure.

[#3]

Bought 2 enclosures.  Each from a different site.  Couldn't believe it.  they were pratically identical.  only thing was one cost more than the other.  got to admit, they were cheapies (shoes, remember)  Between $10 - $20 including shipping!  thing i did notice was that the four pins that are set a couple of spaces away from the other 43 do not connect to the bridge of the enclosure.  since i was getting a reading from the Win device mngr i figured i'd be okey dokey. Right?

[#4]

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since i was getting a reading from the Win device mngr i figured i'd be okey dokey. Right?

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No, I don't believe that's necessarily right. I do think it's a hardware problem.

[#5]

Can you provide a link to either of the boxes so we can check them out?  We might be able to find something out from that.

[#6]

Like I said the enclosures were cheapies, & in case the link doesn't work got one from memory suppliers, Part # h67a1, Kingbyte KU4020-N High Speed USB 2.0 External 2.5" Notebook enclosure.($19)   Did go to Western Digital's website & got the jumper settings for WD Scorpio Hard Drives but didn't download any new device managers.  I'm probably just spinning my wheels here (& yours).  And Jerry DID recommend that I buy an 'external USB harddrive' back on 8/27/09, ummm . . .  did he mean one of those fancy ones that already come initialized and in pretty stand up cases that cost around $100 & up?  That I am suppose to be using by backing up data faithfully to it?

If that is the case, you all will probably band me from this site.

http://apps2.memorysuppliers.com/search/search.php?query=kingbyte+KU4020-N+high+speed+usp+2.0+external+2.5%22+notebook+enclosure&x=30&y=12

[#7]

That's about like mine.  I haven't used it with a brand new driver that wasn't formated though. From what I can tell the 4 pins that you referred to earlier are the jumper pins. 

If you have access to another system you should definitely try it on there to see if it will allow you to format it so it becomes usable on your laptop.

[#8]

All Righty then.  Guess I'll check out the sites you all have given me.  Try the new drive on the other system tomorrow.  Thanks a bunch - I'll owe you!  Until the next time. . .

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[#9]

Hey, I'm back.  And with  SUCCESS!!!!

Was able to take new hard drive and connect to a laptop running VISTA.  VISTA recognized the new hard drive that was in the same USB external enclosure that I was using.  VISTA recognized in both Device Manager & the much needed DISK MANAGER.  Was able to initialize immediately w/no problemos!!  YIPEE SKIPPY.

Did I dare to be BAD?  You betcha!  Took the initialized HD back home & hooked up to the TOSHIBA Satellite 1135-S155.  Again, success.  My old DISK MANAGER saw it, I was able to continue to partition & format it!!!  Why WinXP Home Edition couldn't initialize it? - Is one I'll leave for the cosmos.

Anyway - Who says you can teach an old dog new tricks - HA!  Little did they know about ME - oh, ahem, and of course JERRY aka The HERO and also The Wondrous CEE-64.

So excited was I, and how could I NOT be?  That I immediately tried the FREE Acronis True Image Western Digital Edition that was suggested by The Wondrous CEE-64 on the 08-29-2009 7:03 PM session.  As I was hoochie-cooching around in my NEWER SHOES, I suddenly I noticed that after burning 'Volume 5' onto a CD-R - ERROR MESSAGE (Error occurred while writing to file), hmmm - inserted a different CD-R, again same message, hmmm - inserted a different CD-R yet, hmmm - same message & got the hint.    Shall I go on?  OK you asked for it.

After checking Western Digital website & running one of their programs.  The initialized, partitioned, formatted WD Scorprio Blue HD was just being recognized as a USB Generic Mass Storage Device. Hmmm - maybe because the Western Digital Edition couldn't detect the new hd being from WD, could that be  the problem?  Closed and uninstalled the FREE Acronis True Image Western Digital Edition. 

Per HERO Jerry's suggestion on 8-27-2009 12:00 PM, I downloaded FREE Acronis True Image 2010 Home Edition.  Loaded fine, reread the users guide (serveral times).  Attached the USB external enclosure (YES, the hard drive was inside) started the program, used CLONE DISK option, TA-DA it worked.

Yep, it has to reboot.  Okey-dokey.  UNTIL it came to me having a problem.  This TOSHIBA requires an F1 button to be pushed after start up AND it doesn't like the USB GENERIC MASS STORAGE DEVICE to be attached during boot up.  It stops & requests either F2 (setup) or F_ (I forget) and doesn't respond until I 'safely remove the USB device', then the F1 button.  SOMEHOW, after swapping out the drives  (THAT went really well, pat on the back) & Started the computer up.  YUP, Toshiba intro screen pops up, then the F2 etc. screen, & waited longer than usual.  Pushed the F2, saw that it is the WD drive with larger capacity, exit, then a dark screen with a flashing cursor in the upper left hand corner came on.  That was it.  Nothing for a minute or two, tried just shutting the laptop off.  Wouldn't.  Ended up swapping the hard drives while the fan was running.  Using the old TOSHIBA 40GB drive again.

Whada say?  One more time for old times sake?  Or should I just hang it up?  What do I do now, pleazzzze and thank-you. 

PS - Can't wait, this stuff is getting good!

[#10]

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used CLONE DISK option..

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Nope. Not the way to do it. You want to make a normal backup image (to a third hard drive) and then restore to the new hard drive after it's been installed in the computer.

See my Message #2 in this thread for the way that works.