jfisher08

Tried two different hard drives and neither one worked both power up but never showed up on Idrive tried USB stick and that worked fine. Both drives are formatted FAT32 one is a 30 gig from old laptop and the other is a portable 80 gig simpleTech I bought after first didn't work. Have wma's and mp3"s on both hard drives. Anyone else have this problem?

Rudy

In my experiences, some drives work and some don't due to the limited power that the car provides. Is the drive making any noise at all? What enclosure are you using?

jfisher08

It is making noise like it is reading but nothing comes up on IDrive left it on for over 20 min still nothing I am using a MovingStar enclosure.

jfisher08

Just burnt some of the wma's to a cdr and cd player in car did not recognize the disc

jfisher08

Just bought another drive that dosen't work Maxtor OneTouch lll want to let others know what is not working so they don't have to go thru the same crap I am. Can't believe none of the three worked so mad.
Can someone please tell me of a hard drive that they have had work.
Got a cd with mp3s to work on cd player though.

Rudy

I guess you didn't read the following post then:
http://forums.e60.net/index.php?s=&sho...st&p=451028

(I assumed when you said you formatted it using FAT32 that you read that thread already so I didn't bother to post a link to it earlier this morning.)

I'm using an 80GB Hitachi Travelstar inside a Dynex 2.5" USB enclosure kit (from Best Buy). I will say that the drive usually works but once in a while I have to unplug it and plug it back in while tapping or moving the case around to get it to spin up. There may be a better choice of drive that has a lower power requirement out there...

jfisher08

Thanks Rudy.
Funny I just got done reading thru that post and just ordered the enclosure you used will let you know how it works.

Rudy

Keep in mind that for some reason that enclosure says it only works with drives up to 80GB. There may be a better enclosure out there (or a better enclosure/drive combination) that works better but since we're trail-blazers here, we don't have the luxury of additional data from the experiences of others.

Hopefully more LCI owners with the USB option will start to play around...

Russ1974

I get mine in one week, and trust me, I will be pulling mine to bits, as usual !!

My plan is to get a USB hard drive that also has a power input. I've seen a few around that have that, so you can power them from an alternative source (e.g., not the USB port itself). All I'd need to do would be to get a suitable in car charger, and install this underneath the console. I can tap in to the cigarette lighter sockets that are in the console and make it all nice and hidden - all you'll see is a small cable next to the USB port which will plug in to the drive to supply power.

What I might even do is have the hard-drive completely hidden in the console. You can get 3.5" enclosures which will not only have external power connectivity, but dual USB ports. I could hide this in the console and have it permanently mounted, and have one USB port running off to the car connection. Then, I could fit a visible 2nd port somewhere in the console - or perhaps use the existing one - and have this running to the hidden hard-drive. When I want to change music, just plug my laptop in to the USB port and transfer. I could either sit in the car with the laptop doing this, or just go in to the house and transfer files to the mounted car hard-drive over wifi.

Or... I might be too busy, and just end up sticking with my 16Gb memory stick !!

Rudy

All that gives me a headache. It's much easier to find a drive and enclosure combination that just works off of the USB interface alone. No extra wires, gadgets, etc. My 80GB drive works 90% of the time and when it doesn't work, I'm getting really skilled at hitting it just right to get it to spin up...