Hey guys, here's a problem I've been having but can't fix. I have a hard drive that I use for my music/movies/Rockets games and until two days ago, it's been working fine. It's a Fantom Drive. Easy to use -- I hook up the USB cable to a port on my laptop and boom -- go into My Computer and it's there to access. Then recently I can't find the link to the device on My Computer anymore. My computer indicates that it's plugged in (via the icon in the taskbar and the sound of 'new hardware') -- but zilch on me trying to find it. I've tried this on two laptops, unplug and turned off the device to no avail. Any suggestions?? [EDIT] I tried unistalling and re-installing the driver, also..
Allright, I'll try some troubleshooting: Do you connect to a network via VPN or auto-magically ? If you used a network drive that uses the same letter in your login script that the device uses, Windows could be thinking you want to use the network drive, but it's really NOT. If this is the case, disconnect the network drive, disconnect the device completely (from "My Computer") and then connect only the device. Can you get to the device via the command line?
hmm. I'm not connected to any network(s). How do I get to the device through a command line? (I assume you meant from the 'run' prompt.
Can you see the drive in the Disk Management area of the Computer Management console? (right-click the My Computer icon and hit 'manage') Also, have you tried the device on a different computer?
Xerobull is on the right track here. Process of elimination is a good way to troubleshoot. Have you tried these dudes: http://www.fantomdrives.com/support/faqs/hdfaqpc.php4 ?
well contacted fantom and they said it was a hard drive failure.. and the warranty for repair is only for one year. well, i bought the damned thing 12/14/2004. i guess i have to look at data retrieval or something in my area. thanks for the help guys. 10 years worth of music collection is in that drive.
have someone try to take out the drive and put it into a desktop computer directly. you might be able to get it recognized and if you do, you'll be able to pull your files off. i've seen hdds that are not recognizeable by the USB controller but can be recognized by a IDE controller.
What model exactly is it? I bet they should be able to refurbish it at Fantom... for a small fee... no? I don't know that you could dismantle it and keep the hard disk for IDE connection, but I think that's just too much of a risk.
I would try the IDE thing first, too. Data retrieval services are very very pricey. You're looking at at least a grand, and that's low end. There is software out there that you can try retrieval yourself with. If you're interested I will check into it for you.
Download a Knoppix live CD. Bootup the computer using it -- it should detect the drive even if there is file system corruption on it -- you maybe able to salvage some stuff.
Thanks guys! I'll contact Fantom again to see about the refurbishing and dl Knoppix. It's an 80 GB ext hard drive that I got from Newegg for what I thought was a good price. Damn technology.
