External Hard Drive not being recognized

[sphinxy]

Hi
i have a 500 gb SAMSUNG external hard drive full of pictures movies music and other stuff just plugged it into laptop and a message comes up one of the USB devices attached to this computer as malfunctioned and windows does not recognize it
recommended try re- connecting the device tried this still the same any ideas how to get this working again please

[flobadob]

Try another USB port.

[squarebear]

You DO have a backup I take it just in case the drive is broken?

[deggers316]

turn the comp off then attached it with usb then switch back on again that might work

[wildwood]

Is the HDD in a caddy that could also be used for a DVD/CD player/recorder? They sometimes have an interface that needs a driver.

[galeck1947]

Hi sphinxy
What OS are you using ? If it is XP then go to the device manager and make sure that all of your USB ports are enabled properly . If they are ok shutdown your computer and reboot it . Try another cable usb 2.0 if you dont get it to work failing that try the drive on another computer.

[sphinxy]

Hi Galeck
tried all of this using OS Vista Home Premium still to no avail thanks for all your suggestions though all subscibers that is

[MarkRae]

Sounds very much like the device is faulty. This happens - these things don't last forever...

On the assumption that you don't have a backup, there will be plenty of data recovery companies in your area who will get the data off - however, their services will not be cheap, so you'll need to decide how important the data is to you...

[deggers316]

try plugging it into a friends comp if it works copy all the contents to a cd then you have a back up anyway

[deggers316]

or dvd or buy another external hard drive and copy them