External USB HD Not Recognized

[awally]

Hello,

Here's the story:

I just bought a Seagate Freeagent Desk HD. I plug it in, see Windows (XP Home, SP3) detecting the driver and all that, then it says that the device is ready to use.
I go to look at the drive, and it is not listed in My Computer. In Device Manager, it says that it is, in fact, there as a hard drive.
I then remove the device and unplug the USB. Plugging it in again, Windows says "USB device not recognized", and "device has malfunctioned". I can't see it even in device manager anymore.

I'm not sure what's going on here. The first time this happened, I returned the drive and got a new one (exactly the same problem). The USB port works with other devices, and I have tried the device on other ports. I've tried installing the Seagate Manager software, but it just says that the drive isn't detected. I spoke with technical support, and they say to try it on another computer. Since the same this has happened with two drives, I'm confident that the drive isn't faulty - but I need it to work with this computer.

Sorry for the long post. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

 

[Zatharus]

You may need to format the drive first. It sounds like it was never formatted/partitioned with a Windows compatible file system. Or, your USB port is not getting enough power to the drive.

Plug the drive in, open up the computer manager and access the disk manager. You should see the device listed there. Create a partition and format it. If you do not see the drive listed there, or the disk manager gives you errors trying to access the disk, you probably do not have enough power getting to the drive.

Did you swap the drive for the exact same model? Do you hear the drive spin up when it is connected?

 

[effinMaster]

make sure you have all the updates and drivers for it as well