Hi guys, I have pulled out the 2.5" 320gb WD sata drive out of my old MSI laptop which was becoming long in the tooth. I've put the drive into a caddy and connected it to the new laptop via usb. It is detected as drive E: but the only files I can see are a Utility folder with MSI stuff in there and and MSI config file. How do I access it so that I can pull off my pics and music and then format it so I can use it as a backup drive? The drive does have a windows password setup on it but no bios password. I'm thinking the issue is a security based one?
If it is the Active system drive of another computer, windows will automatically disable it to avoid conflicts. To get round this just go into the disk management section of computer management (administrator tools in control panel, or possibly right click my computer and select manage) and right click on the partition you want to enable, you should get the option to in the menu that appears. I've done this on my computer without any issues but I'd recommend getting all your data off in one session and formatting the drive so windows doesn't see 2 active partitions at bootup.
Heya, I did that but it only shows 172gb, so half the drive looks to be in a hidden partition. The only options in disk manager are to shrink the volume or delete, I can't open the hidden bit
So in disk management, the entire space that shows you the partitions is taken up by this 172GB? is this how you set the partitions up in the laptop?
The drive is displayed as drive E: @ 172gb (even though it is a 320gb drive). The only other info in that screen is the local C: drive which has a D: partition (the HP laptops own section).
I presume none of the drive or data was encrypted automatically? What motherboard do you have? does it have more than one SATA controller?
Nah it should all be unencrypted - I've never encrypted. The 320gb drive is from an MSI laptop and I'm trying to access it via a USB caddy on my new (HP) laptop. Suppose I could connect it to my desktop pc via SATA but I reckon I'll get the same result.
