Portable Hard Drive not working - help appreciated!

novocaine

Member
May 17, 2011
6
1
Thanks for all the help guys. I'm going to look into reformatting my hard drive as soon as I can. Maybe the phones don't work because they aren't plug and play - they need drivers don't they??
 

spexwood

Member
May 11, 2011
229
18
Thanks for all the help guys. I'm going to look into reformatting my hard drive as soon as I can. Maybe the phones don't work because they aren't plug and play - they need drivers don't they??

Now that you mention it, that could actually be it. They arent plug and play and when you first plug the phones into a computer, you always have to wait for Windows to download the drivers. Of course, Android 3 doesnt do this and drivers probably dont event exist anyways.

You may have solved that problem :)
 

AQ_OC

Member
May 14, 2011
313
8
We all need to remember that Honeycomb 3.0.1 is version 1.0 of Android for Tablets. As such, it is buggy and full of un-implemented features. That's just how software works.

If you want to get to the storage on the phone, remover the fat32-formatted SD card and put that into a the Acer. You should be able to see it then. When it is inside the phone, there is a bunch of electronics between the card and the tablet, hence the need for a driver.
 

spexwood

Member
May 11, 2011
229
18
Earlier today, I sent an email to Acer reporting many of the bugs and unsolved issues that people are having on this forum. Included, I asked about whether the tablet (not Honeycomb in specifically) will support non-FAT devices. If I get reasonable answers to the bugs and questions, Ill post them in a new thread.

I got my response from Acer today. The thanked me for the bug reports and basically just told me that the Iconia a500 will not support non-FAT devices UNLESS Honeycomb decides to first. The FAT limitation is a Honeycomb thing and has nothing to do with the actual tablet. So, until Honeycomb lifts that limitation (assuming possible), the A500 will only be able to use FAT DEVICES.

Another thing in case anyone is interested is that there are no plans for more video codec support. So, no native support for VOB, MKV, etc.
(Sucks for me because my old piece of crap tablet, Archos 101, running Android 2.2 was able to play just about everything).
 

Fonske68

Member
Jul 21, 2011
1
0
Now here's another problem: I use a WD 1 TB external drive wich I formatted fat32. After testing it a bit with some ripped and to MP4 converted DVD's it played those well. After spending a couple of days ripping and converting my fav. movies, I tried to play them on my iconia using clear.fi. When i plug in the drive, it either freezes up or reboots where I before saw the ext.usb storage with my films. Tried everything; reboot with/without plugged in drive, start clear.fi and then plug in drive. Nothing seems to work. Is there a limitation to external memory that I don't know about? Software problem? Do I need to do a factory reset?
 

OutaDaDark

Member
Mar 18, 2011
19
1
USB Mount All and MoboPlayer.... Both problems solved. If they don't explain themselves very well in Market, post back and we'll go through them.

:)
 

Wenson

Member
Sep 25, 2011
1
0
I have a 1TB Western Digital Passport that is USB powered and FAT32 formatted. No problems reading it (and no, the USB slot doesnt ONLY read thumbdrives and keyboards FYI).

Have you tried rebooting the tablet? I have had issues on other tablets where, for whatever reason, the USB slots stop work and a reboot reenables them.
Try rebooting without the device plugged in and then plugging it in after startup. If nothing, then plug the device in and leave it in during reboot.




If that doesnt work, then plug the drive into a computer, right click it, select properties, and double check that it is FAT32. This is just to be certain. You may find that you thought it was FAT32 but its actuallt NTFS.



Next check that your AVIs are in the right format. The a500 is format picky.



If none of those options work, then try another (or a few) usb devices. Remember that they must be FAT (FAT16) or FAT32 Make sure the USB slot is functioning. If it is, then it must be the drive. If nothing else is working, then your USB slot must be faulty and you need to contact Acer regarding your warranty.



I wish you luck. Keep us informed.

********************
My case:
I have a 500 GB usb drive. It works fine with Acer Iconia 500(regular desktop USB drive, external power). So I bought WD My passport 1 TB formatted to Fat32. I thought it would work with my Iconia 500

( I checked the format in WIndows 7, it is Fat32) When I connected the WD drive to Acer Iconia 500, Iconia 500 shutdown and tried to reboot. but never bootup again. I forced power off the Iconia, then disconnected the WD drive. Iconia boots tup fine.
But no matter boot the divice with WD 1 TB Drive connected or Plug it latter, Iconia always shuts down when it tries to access the 1 TB USB drive.
I also tried with AC power in, No difference.

My OS version is 3.1.

Any idea to fix the problem?
 

StoneKy

Member
Jul 30, 2011
280
21
********************
So I bought WD My passport 1 TB formatted to Fat32. I thought it would work with my Iconia 500

I have two (2) 1 TB WD Passport's. One (1) bought 12/10 and the other this month. Both are out of the box formatted NTFS.
 

Douvie

Senior Member
Jun 10, 2011
1,030
71
********************
My case:
I have a 500 GB usb drive. It works fine with Acer Iconia 500(regular desktop USB drive, external power). So I bought WD My passport 1 TB formatted to Fat32. I thought it would work with my Iconia 500

( I checked the format in WIndows 7, it is Fat32) When I connected the WD drive to Acer Iconia 500, Iconia 500 shutdown and tried to reboot. but never bootup again. I forced power off the Iconia, then disconnected the WD drive. Iconia boots tup fine.
But no matter boot the divice with WD 1 TB Drive connected or Plug it latter, Iconia always shuts down when it tries to access the 1 TB USB drive.
I also tried with AC power in, No difference.

My OS version is 3.1.

Any idea to fix the problem?
Upgrade to 3.2.

I have no problems even with the WD ELEMENTS 2 TB, WD 2.5' 1TB and various others.

Honeycombe 3.2 has the built-in option to mount/umount. What about power to your drives?
 
Top