400GB may be beyond some case capabilities. I've also run into people who didn't start fresh by removing the partitions and making them anew. Also some front USB ports have issues. Use the rear ports.
Bob
I have a 400Gb SATA drive which was purchased about 18 months ago. I've been trying to use it as an external USB drive on Windows XP Pro (SP2), using two different makes of SATA USB 2.0 enclosure. The drive connects OK, and shows up as an external drive, but as soon as I attempt to copy any data onto it I get problems: either Explorer hangs, or I get "delayed write failure". This happens within 2 minutes of initiating the file copy.
I've tried copying different folders and files, and I've tried it on 3 different machines (3 different motherboard makes, but all running XP SP2). In each case I connected the drive to one of the rear USB ports (i.e. not to an external hub).
I tried this with two different brands of USB 2.0 SATA enclosure, and got exactly the same result. In both cases the enclosures were independently powered by DC power adapters.
I then installed the drive internally into one of the machines, to check that it wasn't faulty. It installed fine, and I was able to copy huge numbers of files to it without any problems, so it looks as if the drive is OK. I also left it running there all day without any problems.
I just purchased a Lacie 500Gb external USB 2.0 drive and this works perfectly well with all of the 3 PC's that failed my tests with the other drive enclosures.
Is there any reason why specific SATA drives may be unsuitable for use in external USB enclosures?

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