External drive compatibility

[jyeh74]

I have a external 1TB Western Digital. It works with HP, IBM laptops. My Asus won't read it.

Have you heard of certain hard drive brands being uncompatible with certain computers?

[Video Head]

USB or eSATA?

[jyeh74]

Usb 3.0

This one
http://reviews.cnet.com/external-hard-drives/wd-my-passport-portable/4505-3190_7-35178076.html

[Video Head]

Does the same port on the Asus work with other USB devices? How old is the Asus? What is the Asus's native USB support?

[jyeh74]

Yes, there is only one port on the Asus ux21a. I just bought this and am going through set up so it is brand new.
I just tried a thumb drive and it reads it. Win7 64-bit machine.

This one.
http://www.amazon.com/ZENBOOK-UX21A-1AK3-Ultrabook-i5-3317U-Travel/dp/B00A1GWG82/ref=s...sus+ux21a-1ak3

[Video Head]

If it is a new system try updating to the most recent USB driver from Asus for your system. USB is fully forwards and backwards compatible, speed is the only variable. Some 3.0 devices will require a recent driver.

[budz]

go to asus website and update to latest drivers for USB 3.

[jyeh74]

I downloaded the latest USB version V1.0.5.235 but the WD My Passport still does not read

http://support.asus.com/Download.aspx?SLanguage=en&m=UX21A&p=3&s=368

[FulciLives]

Does the external HDD have it's own power supply or does it derive all of it's power from the USB connection?

Why do I ask this?

If it draws the power from the USB connection then your ASUS isn't putting out enough power. The solution? Use an external power source for your HDD (i.e., plug it into the wall for power). I have heard of cases where some external HDD's don't have external power and yet the device it is being used with can't offer enough power through USB to run the HDD and in such cases you are screwed with no solution.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[jyeh74]

Does the external HDD have it's own power supply or does it derive all of it's power from the USB connection?

Why do I ask this?

If it draws the power from the USB connection then your ASUS isn't putting out enough power. The solution? Use an external power source for your HDD (i.e., plug it into the wall for power). I have heard of cases where some external HDD's don't have external power and yet the device it is being used with can't offer enough power through USB to run the HDD and in such cases you are screwed with no solution.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

My passport western digitial is USB power. There is no external power source.
So you are saying the ASUS is weak? My HP, Toshiba and my IBM reads it no problem.

[FulciLives]

I would never ever buy an external HDD that doesn't at least have the option of using external power. That was mistake number one on your part.

Anyway, yes, I suspect very strongly that the problem is that your ASUS is not outputting enough juice to run that HDD properly.

The only solution that might work is if you get a USB hub that has external power. Note that some USB hubs have no external power (I think that is the more common type) but some do and if you are lucky then that will work.

Personally I'd return that HDD for one that has external power.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[jyeh74]

The reason I bought this one was because it was easy to use and did not have so many wires. I didn't know that external power source was crucial. Is this common?

Has anyone else have a problem with laptops not being able to read WD drives?

[FulciLives]

I don't know how common it is but yes it is "well known" that some devices (in this case your ASUS) do not provide enough power out of their USB connection to drive USB devices that solely rely on USB for their power demands.

For this reason alone it is recommended to buy external HDD's that have their own dedicated external power adapter.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

P.S.
A USB Thumb Drive doesn't have nearly the power demands of a full HDD

[CobraPilot]

I have several external USB HDs. All came with a dual cable that allows the user to plug into TWO usb ports at the same time to provide extra power to the HD when there is insufficient power from a single USB port.

One USB connection to the computer is power + data; the other is power only.

Putting my ear close, the sound of the HD trying to boot when power is too low is completely different from the sound when the power is sufficient. Dead giveaway.

From the description in the review link above, it sounds like yours did not come with such a dual-power cable. I'd try one of those on your unit.

[hello_hello]

Can hear/feel the external drive spinning or vibrating a little when it's working? Does it have an LED to let you know it's got power? Does the PC emit it's annoying USB "ding" sound when you connect the drive?

I guess the first thing to work out is if the drive's getting power and spinning. If it is then you'll need to work out why the PC can't see it, If it isn't then maybe the USB port on the Asus isn't being powered for some reason. Do you have a USB thumb drive or even a mouse you can plug into the USB port to see if it's working?

Some external drives have a USB lead with two USB connectors on the PC end, so they can draw power from 2 USB ports. I think one of those connectors would be power only. The drive doesn't use one of those, does it?

[lingyi]

I have a WD Passport and it is picky about USB ports. It does seem to a have the low power issue you're having. There is no additional power cable attached or to my knowledge available for these drives.

Try the following:

Use different ports. USB 3 first, then USB 2. On my laptop, the drive sometimes doesn't connect on the USB 2 port, but will on the USB 3.

Do you anything else plugged into any of the other ports? If you do, unplug them. You may be starving the drive of the necessary power.

Try a different, shorter USB cable. I sometimes use USB extension cables and my drive won't work on the longer ones (~6 ft). I've used longer (up to 6 ft) USB 3 cables on my passport, but the one that came with the drive is ~18". There's a reason it's so short!

Get a powered USB hub as suggested. This will prove or disprove that the drive just isn't recognized by the laptop (unlikely).

Try the above. I'm hopeful one will work for you!

Edit: Along with what hello_hello said, pick up the drive (carefully!) while it's plugged in. You should be able to feel it having a slight gyroscopic effect (pulling one way or the other) while it spinning. if it's spins, then powers down, then spins again, it's not getting enough power.

[p_l]

I'm not overly pleased with USB 3.0. I got a couple of these and I can't say that things have gone smoothly. Among other things, and this took me a while to put 2 and 2 together, they make Acronis True Image 2010 crash when they're connected. A forced "upgrade" to a more recent version solved the problem. I really feel that eSATA was a more reliable technology, but it now seems all but abandoned by external drive manufacturers.

[hello_hello]

I was having issues with my USB3 PCI-express card. It'd only run at USB2 speed, or the drive would lose connection midway through a transfer. I read of similar USB3 problems with some ASUS motherboards (onboard USB3) and a solution offered in one forum also worked for me. The penny finally dropped after realising my USB3 connection was perfectly stable when the PC was running at normal speed, but the problems returned with the CPU slightly overclocked.

Instead of leaving the BIOS PCI bus speed setting on "auto" as it usually is, I manually set it to 100Hz and my USB3 connections are now rock solid. I don't know why..... but it worked, and I tried about 57 other unsuccessful fixes first.

I don't like eSATA because the connectors/cables tend to be more fiddly, you can't plug an eSATA device into anything but an eSATA port whereas USB3 is backwards compatible with USB2 and every PC has one of those, and using devices such as dual hard drive docks simply work via USB. Similar eSATA devices require the SATA controller in the PC to support port multiplying, and it's still not the norm for them to do so, and in my experience even when they do it can be fairly hit and miss whether it'll work reliably. USB just does. Well the majority of the time.

[p_l]

Instead of leaving the BIOS PCI bus speed setting on "auto" as it usually is, I manually set it to 100Hz and my USB3 connections are now rock solid. I don't know why..... but it worked, and I tried about 57 other unsuccessful fixes first.

Interesting tip, but in my computer's BIOS, unlike in this picture, the "USB Legacy Mode Support" (is that what you're referring to?) is grayed out.

[hello_hello]

The option you'd need is PCI bus speed. It's nothing to do with any USB setting in the BIOS. If your motherboard can't overclock then maybe it won't have that option. I'd have to reboot to check, but I'm pretty sure in my BIOS the PCI bus speed setting is in the page dedicted to overclocking.

If I remember correctly there were lots of people posting complaints in forums about the USB3 built into Asus MB's at one stage. The most common were Windows popping up with a "this device can run faster" message when connecting a USB3 device, because the USB3 port had dropped back to USB2 speed, and the other was the connected device constantly losing connection. I had both. I don't know why but maybe it's a problem with a particular USB3 chipset being sensitive to bus speed. I think mine uses an NEC controller.

Anyway, I just thought I'd post my fix in case it works for someone else. I guess maybe some motherboards don't keep as tight a reign on bus speed as they should, especially when overclocking, and some devices are fussy about it.

[p_l]

The option you'd need is PCI bus speed. It's nothing to do with any USB setting in the BIOS. If your motherboard can't overclock then maybe it won't have that option. I'd have to reboot to check, but I'm pretty sure in my BIOS the PCI bus speed setting is in the page dedicted to overclocking.

Thanks; unfortunately, I'm not seeing any such option in my BIOS.