Using Windows 2000 SP4. The problem is that a Western Digital "My Passport Essential" external USB hard drive won't auto-detect as a mass storage device. It only is detected as a "USB 2.0 Device", which then prompts the New Hardware Wizard...and of course I have no 3rd party driver to install. Can I force it to use USBSTOR.SYS somehow? More details if needed... My motherboard's USB isn't 2.0, so I have an IOGEAR 5-port USB 2.0 PCI card installed. I have the host controller/hub drivers from IOGEAR installed (OWC 2.1.9.0, ousb2hub.sys and ousbehci.sys). This is the only USB controller/hub I have displaying in my Device Manager (I disabled my motherboard USB ports in the BIOS just to eliminate confusion). I have two other USB 2.0 mass storage devices working fine on it...a Memorex DVD writer (which does indeed display as connected at USB 2.0 and does indeed burn at USB 2.0 speeds...I've burned at 1.0 speeds before so I know the green/2.0 light on the back isn't lying) and a 1-Gig USB 2.0 Flash Drive. Device Manager info looks like this when I have the above two devices plugged in: Universal Serial Bus controllers USB Mass Storage Device USB Mass Storage Device Universal Serial Bus controllers USB 2.0 PCI to USB Enhanced Host Controller USB 2.0 Root Hub Device Thanks, Ernest
Ernest wrote in news:stSdnYOW1IK3mqjVnZ2dnUVZ_g6dnZ2d@giganews.com: > Using Windows 2000 SP4. > > The problem is that a Western Digital "My Passport Essential" external > USB hard drive won't auto-detect as a mass storage device. It only is > detected as a "USB 2.0 Device", which then prompts the New Hardware > Wizard...and of course I have no 3rd party driver to install. Can I > force it to use USBSTOR.SYS somehow? Western Digital support was useless (tried both phone and e-mail support, but they had no good ideas or advice to offer), but wow, iogear's phone support was awesome...glad I decided to try it as a last resort! The guy knew immediately that it was just a power problem...external drives need too much power for the PCI USB card to supply. Would've never guessed that, considering Windows was at least detecting the device. So I took the WD drive back for a refund and got an AC-powered Maxtor 500GB external USB drive instead. Worked perfectly. I love happy endings, Ernest
