Help please on external hard drive enclosure

First off, great forum you have here. I have been browsing it for a couple of months and learned a lot from it. I have a problem with my new 3.5" enclosure. I recently bought a 160gb seagate hard drive(internal) and bought an enclosure http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...AMEWA%3AIT&rd=1
My usb driver does not respond properly. It will say usb Mass storage and have a yellow triangle in device manager. It hooked up and worked properly once but hasn't since. I am not sure what the problem could be, maybe the driver isn't installing properly. Thanks in advance for any help. Oh and by the way it is the cypress chipset on the enclosure.

any suggestions?

what version of Windows are you using? If 98 or Me, you will need to install the driver from the cd. If 2000 or XP, no driver is needed. You need to make sure the hard drive jumper is set to master. Look for help on the drive label. You will need to initialize and format the drive. You do this by right clicking on My Computer, click on Manage, then click on disk management. Click on the drive and you will be prompted to initialize it. After it is done, you then have to format it.

I have xp, the problem is installing the usb driver it always messes up and only works at times. I have formatted this drive and connected once or twice but i always get an error with the driver...is there an updated usb mass storage driver i can use? Thanks for your help.

What brand of computer do you have? Or what is the brand name of the motherboard?

I am not sure of the motherboard. But it has been tested on both a Dell Inspiron 9300 1.6 Centrino 512mb ram Windows XP SP2.
The other computer has been tested on a P4 2.4ghz dell dimension 4600 512 ram Windows XP SP1. It seems like the driver can only install sometimes, when it is installed fine it will run perfectly but when it isn't it is frustrating and sometimes doesn't install for many days. Thanks.

http://tinyurl.com/dcg4m This may be your problem not getting enough power.Read Power Limitations,refers to powered external USB HUB.I looked at your enclosure from Ebay.I would not run the hard drive constantly when not using it,without an enclosure with fan.That's just my humble opinion.The add also says no driver needed except Win 98.You are running XP.If you were running Windows ME=OH! MY! GOD!

hahaha thank god im not! well thank's for the info, yeah i was clueless as to the description on ebay. I mean it has worked for me sometimes but it is erratic. Not getting enough power, is there anything i can do? I mean it does have a AC adapter which is used at all times. This hard drive is mainly for storage and only on for short periods of time.

Make sure the jumper on the hard drive is set to master. If you still are having problems, because it won't work reliably on more than one computer, I'd say it is the enclosure. Make sure the connections in the enclosure are tight.

hmm they are...dang. Oh well i guess i'll have to get another enclosure then. Do you have any suggestions?

the best advice i can give is not to buy another one off eBay. try one of THESE from a trustworthy site.

what Geeks said. I can vouch for the Rosewill and the Vantec. Also the Bytecc. I stock them in my business and sell lots of them. Zero returns on any so far.

********One more very important thing. Replace the usb cable you have been using!!!!!! That cable could be bad, causing intermittent operation. Would explain problems on different computers also.....***********

Just thought about that while backing up my server. Using an external drive. Noticed the usb cable.

all right great! thank's for all the help!

oh by the way does this mean the enclosure is worthless like nothing can help it?

You could try a smaller/older hard drive, it may be that the hdd is a bit hungry.