Windows quit reading EXTERNAL hard drive. I have a Lacie 250 gig external hard drive that I store files on. For some reason windows quit reading it and I get the message "disk is not formated"
I did a system restore and it came back for sometime but now it does not work again I get that "disk is not formated" message.

The device is working properly according to device manager...windows will just not read it!

The INFORMATION I beleive is still on the hard drive as I used some free temp software to view it before you buy type thing.

I tried re-installing drive (unplug replug) etc....no good.


My windows isVersion 5.1 (Build 2600.xpsp_sp2_gdr.07227-2254 : Service Pack2)

Dell dimension 3000
Processor INTEL(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.80GHz
Processor Speed 2.73 GHz
Memory (RAM) 1024 MB
Operating System Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
Operating System Version 5.1.2600

ANY IDEAS OR HELP APPRECIATED
CAN I GET ONLINE HELP THANKSUnfortunately this does sometimes happen to USB hard drives. You will most likely have to pay to unlock the recovery software.

But look here first

http://www.softwarepatch.com/tips/howto-file-recovery.html

Under "Properties" for that drive what is the file system type listed? My bet is that it says RAW and it used to be NTFS. Let us know. Yes your correct it says "raw"...what do I do? Please let me know in laymen terms as I'm pretty good at computer stuff when it comes to searching the web etc. but I don't understand dos etc. and mainly been a user under instructions only on sites. Thanks this seems to be a positive lead.

Also any clues as to why this changed and quit working?