External hard drive (yes, again)

O

opus_az

Member
My Western Digital "By Book 500 GB USB" hard drive does not appear as a drive on my Windows. It's seen by my OS X just fine.

The hard drive is formatted one partition MS-DOS File System.
Parallels verion 3.0 build 4128
Windows XP-Pro SP 2
24" iMac intel

'External Hard drive' appears in the Parallels Devices/USB menu and I can checkmark it.

I've read a few other threads here, but nothing helps.

A little frustrated here. I'd sure appreciate any other suggestions.

TIA,
O.
 
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Hi O,

This may sound silly but did you install the soft ware from the WD into your Parallels vm?
kat
 
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I am confused as to what your issue is. You say your hard drive does appear in Windows and does appear in OSX. You can checkmark it. Did I misunderstand?

When you checkmark it, you should hear an audible beep. You should also be able to click on "My Computer" in Windows and see it there.

Please clarify the issue you are trying to solve.
 
I have a WD Passport portable USB 120 GB hard drive. It appeared in osx and xp but I had to install WD Sync, in xp vm for it to work properly.

Hope this helps.

Kat
 
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Wacky business. (First, sorry for the typo in the original post, that was supposed to say it does not appear as a drive. Maybe leaving out 'not' might change the meaning. Sorry. Sheesh. I've edited the post).

Anyway...turns out my Windows sees the drive fine, it just takes an astounding 2-3 minutes after checking the 'external drive' option in the Devices\USB menu before it appears as a drive.

2-3 minutes??? Yikes!! Is that normal? Is that because it's 500GB? or maybe something's not right in the drive? or maybe something's wrong with my Parallels?

Thx,
O.
 
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3 Minutes is a long time...Do you have a lot of information stored on the drive?
Maybe you need to defrag that thing...or disk clean-up....it just may be the size 500 gb is BIG. When I plug in my WD it takes no more 30 seconds. Do you plug it into the USB port after xp is opened?
 
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Hi...the drive is empty. I've had the drive for a little while. At first I had it formatted for Mac OS but I've since reformatted as MS-DOS since now I only need it for my VM. I leave the drive connected when I launch the VM. I have the VM configured for the USB Controller to be enabled and to connect to guest.
 
I tried a little experiment this morning. I plugged my WD HD in before I turned on my Mac Book Pro. Had all the same issues you stated in your first post. Try plugging in your USB after you vm has booted. I use several USB devices and I find it works best for me that way.

kat
 
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