external hard drive troubles

[james01843]

I have just brought a western digital hard drive and when i plug it in to the usb port it makes the computer crash.

Does anyone know what i need to do to get it to work, ive tryed everything i know with no luck. This includes testing all

the usb ports, checking that it is usb 2.0 and deleting and reinstalling the drivers. The drive also works as i have

tested it on two other computers. PLEASE HELP...thnx

[Goku2008]

Hi James, It seems to me that the problem is the hard drive or at least that my experience with them.. the only difference is that in my case the the HD would either crash the computer or turn it off and it happened in 3 different computers in my case the driver was either old or somebody had messed with it, if it's a brand new HD you could take it to the place you got it from or you could go to the WD web site and check the warranty... you might wanna try to test it again in other computer if you can.

sorry I can't be much more help.

[CoffeeFiend]

It seems to me that the problem is the hard drive or at least that my experience with them

That goes directly against mine. ~100% of the time I've seen such problems, it's been a problem with the USB controllers on the motherboard. And like he said, the drive works perfectly on other computers. VIA chipset by any chance?

[puntoMX]

Also, are we talking about a 2.5" drive or a 3.5"?

[james01843]

Hi thanks for your replys, i will give you as much info as i know about the hard drive and computer as i can to see

if this will help. The mother board is an asrock k8upgrade vm800. The hard drive is 2.5.

Below is the motherboard spec from the manual.

Platform: Micro ATX Form Factor: 9.0-in x 9.6-in, 22.9 cm x 24.4 cm

CPU: 754-Pin Socket Supporting advanced 64-bit AMD AthlonTM 64

and 32-bit Sempron Processor

Supports AMD’s Cool ‘n’ QuietTM Technology (see CAUTION 1)

Chipsets: North Bridge: VIA K8M800 Chipset

FSB @ 800 MHz / 1.6 GT/s

South Bridge: VIA VT8237R Chipset

Supports USB 2.0, ATA 133, SATA 1.5Gb/s

Memory: 2 x DDR DIMM Slots: DDR1 and DDR2

Support PC3200 (DDR400) / PC2700 (DDR333) /

PC2100 (DDR266), Max. 2GB

IDE: IDE1: ATA 133 / Ultra DMA Mode 6

IDE2: ATA 133 / Ultra DMA Mode 6

Supports up to 4 IDE Devices

Serial ATA: 2 x SATA Connectors

Supports up to 2 SATA Devices at 1.5Gb/s Data Transfer Rate

Floppy Port: Supports up to 2 Floppy Disk Drives

Audio: 5.1 channels AC’97 Audio

OnBoard VGA: Intergrated UniChrome PRO 3D/2D Graphics Controller

, supports DirectX 8.1

LAN: Speed: 802.3u (10/100 Ethernet), Supports Wake-On-LAN

Hardware Monitor: CPU Temperature Sensing

Motherboard Temperature Sensing

CPU Overheat Shutdown to Protect CPU Life

(ASRock U-COP)(see CAUTION 2)

CPU Fan Tachometer

Chassis Fan Tachometer

Voltage Monitoring: +12V, +5V, +3.3V, Vcore

Future CPU Port: Supports CPU upgrade from AMD 754-Pin CPU to

AMD 939-Pin CPU (see page 13 for details)

PCI Slots: 2 x PCI Slots, PCI Specification 2.2

AGP slot: 1 x AGP Slot

Supports 1.5V, 8X / 4X AGP Card (see CAUTION 3)

AMR slot: 1 slot, supports ASRock MR card (Optional)

USB 2.0: 8 USB 2.0 Ports:

6 Ready-to-Use USB 2.0 Ports on the I/O Panel

Plus 2 On-Board Headers Supporting 2 Extra USB 2.0 Ports

Its defenatly nothing to do with the hard drive because i have changed it twice and it works on other computers.

Any help would be great....thanks

[CoffeeFiend]

Old VIA chipset, just like I expected...

I would personally buy a USB PCI card.

[james01843]

Would that be the only way to solve the problem?

[CoffeeFiend]

You can try fiddling with VIA's USB drivers, filter patches and such, but as far as I've seen, the only way to have properly working USB ports (that work for good, reliably and all) on a board that uses those older VIA chipsets, is to not use them i.e. get a card. Those old VIA-based USB ports are the very worst and the most flaky I've ever seen (and thankfully they don't make chipsets anymore!)... Newegg has a 4 port PCI card for $6.50, it's not like they're expensive.

[james01843]

Thanks for all your help i will buy one of those. cheers.