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Studio 1537 and external eSata HDD
Hello,
i have a Dell Studio 1537 with Windows Vista Home Premium SP1. On my Laptop i have an eSata conenctor and tried to use an external eSata HDD with it. Unfortunately i cannot access the drive on Vista. It´s a Seagate Barracuda Sata II 500 GB in a Sharkoon Rapid Case. Using USB i have no problems on Vista.
I also have Ubuntu 8.10 on the Laptop. I have no problems with the eSata drive on Ubuntu. It just works.
I tried the following:
- Connect eSata HDD while Vista was running -> not detected
- Shutdown while eSata powered on -> no shutdown
- Boot while eSata powered on -> no boot
- BIOS is set to ahci
- Enabled ahci in Vista regestry -> nearly crashed the whole Vista, had to recover from previous point
How can i use an external HDD via the eSata connection?
Best regards
Andreas
TheRealFireblad
4.6K Posts
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November 26th, 2008 08:00
Welcome to the forums Andreas :emotion-5:
I use an AC Ryan eSATA/USB enclosure on my XPS M1730 (via an eSATA ExpressCard), and it has a switch on the rear of the enclosure, for when I want/need to use it via USB - i.e. on an older system with no eSATA connection.
So check the back of the enclosure, to see if there's not a USB/eSATA switch?
asztybryc
3 Posts
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November 26th, 2008 11:00
Hello,
thanks for your reply.
There is no switch on the enclosure. I can take it as is, reboot with Ubuntu and use it with eSata. It works perfect.
But with Vista ... no way. If i switch the device on before booting, Vista doesn´t even boot. If i switch it on after a boot, i can´t even start an explorer :(
Andreas
bardbennett
1 Message
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April 18th, 2009 16:00
I have recently purchased a NexStar MX USB/eSATA enclosure to use for a RAID 1 array. It is equiped with a pair of Seagate Barracuda (ST31500341AS) 1.5 TB drives. I am able to connect, via USB, on my Studio 1537 to use the enclosure as a pair of individual drives and as either a RAID 0 or RAID 1 array. I am able to use the enclosure and its drives in all of these modes with a simple setting of internal switches.
Unfortunately I am unable to use the enclosure with the eSATA connection. My experience has been much the same as you describe and has required me to recover the system from backups several times. When I examine the machine set-up by booting up and pressing "F2" I see that the eSATA entry is listed as "none" and there is no way to change it.
The user's manual for the enclosure states: "For eSATA, the system must support Port Multiplier (PM) specification." How do I determine if my Studio 1537 supports Port Multiplier specification? I don't know what this phrase means and have been unsuccessful in finding an explanation via a Google search.
Have you been sucessfull in solving your problem? Do you have any advice on how I can 1) educate myself on the Port Multiplier specification definition? 2) successfully use the eSATA port?
Sincerely,
Bard Bennett
asztybryc
3 Posts
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April 20th, 2009 02:00
Hi Bard,
the bad news: I do not know anything about a Port Multipliert.
The good news: I solved my problem.
I own a SATA II HDD but the Windows driver is not able to handle the SATA II protocol correctly. So i jumpered the HDD according to it´s manual to SATA I.
This is annoying, because it is much slower than SATA II but still faster than USB.
Another problem could be that the eSATA connectors are not standard connectors. The length of the connectors vary. I have two cables with different connector lengths. In another forum there was an advice to use a razor to remove some millimeters of the rubber around the connector so the cable can be conencted deeper into the enclosure. I tried this before i found out the thing about SATA I. The cable still works :)
I hope this could help you solving your problem.
Best regards
Andreas
dean402002
1 Message
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May 29th, 2009 01:00
hi since esata does not work quite the same as usb drives I found that although the machine knows its there it will not work directly under vista until I used control panel then administrative tools then storeage to actually manualy mount the drive to vista with an assigned drive letter.
after this i was able to use the esata drive with ease hope this helps
regards
dean