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General discussion

I need help with my Ext. hard drive please!

Nov 7, 2009 2:38PM PST

Okay, so I was trying yo figure out a way to split my Maxtor One-Touch 500 GB hard drive so I could format each half a different form. I'm running on a Compaq Presario XP. I right-clicked on My Computer, selected manage, and chose disk management over in the sidebar. I saw my drive (under DHappy and right clicked it. I chose delete partition so then I could, I don't know, I thought it would help me. But, now my Ex. hard drive isn't being detected under My Computer, so I can't access it. When I plug it in it still makes the doo-duh sound. The drive is still installed AND working (or at least it said it was). The power cable is working fine, the light stays on. I've tried many usb cables and that isn't the problem. I've even tried other computers and they all did the same thing (after installing the drive). I'm really needing help. Thanks for looking and I hope I explained enough.

Discussion is locked

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The drive is fine.
Nov 7, 2009 9:15PM PST

And since there is no partitions there is nothing that should show in Explorer.

Go back the disk management and create a partition and then format that. After that, you should be good.
Bob

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Solution
Nov 8, 2009 6:09AM PST

There was no place to create a new partition and format, but I found out what to do. I'll post that so that if anyone else runs into this problem, they can be helped.

1. Download the Maxtor Maxblast program at http://www.seagate.com/support/maxblast/MaxBlastSetup.en.exe

2. Make sure your ex hard drive is plugged in

3. Run the program

4. It will come up with a message saying, "A blank disc has been found. Do you want to prepare the disc for data and, if necessary, copy your files onto it? Click NO to skip these steps and keep the disc as is."

5. Slect Yes (of course)

6. Click next two times, then make sure the "Create new partition in unallocated space" is checke.

7.Then click next seven more times (unless you want to change any of those setting) and choose proceed. It will do the process and in the end saying "New disc was successfully added."

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Good to read.
Nov 8, 2009 6:36AM PST

Many don't want to use the native tools so your method is good too.