WD passport works in USB 2, but not 3?

brisa117

Distinguished
Mar 16, 2010
239
1
18,710
So, I picked up a 1TB WD passport about a week ago to help me move wedding videos between my desktop and laptop (I film weddings) so I can edit on the go. The drive is working nicely, except when I try to use it in a USB 3.0 port on my desktop (laptop is only 2.0). It gets power, but never shows up as a drive. One post that I found suggested that the WD USB 3.0 cable was crap and to try another. So I found the only other USB 3.0 cable I had and plugged it in. It worked! BUT has since stopped working. The drive functions in a USB 2.0 port (I know that USB 2.0 doesn't use all of the connectors for 3.0), but I really miss the speed I was getting when the 3.0 cable worked. Suggestions? I'm running:

-- Windows 8.1 Preview
-- ASUS Sabertooth 990FX Motherboard
-- 32GB RAM G.Skill 1600mhz
-- AMD FX-8350 (OC@4.63)
-- Pair of 7970's in crossfire
-- Samsung 830 256GB
-- WD wd20earx 2TB drive

Final thought: I do have a HTPC with USB 3.0 ports, but I haven't tried that yet. It's running Win7 on an AMD platform. I can try that if you think it would help.
Thanks for all the suggestions in advance!
 
Solution
try going into the device manager and deleting the external drive and driver.
Then remove the drive and shutdown the pc.
Boot backup after a minute and when windows is done loading reattach the external which should cause the driver to reload.
Let us know if that helped. You might have to do that again but include the usb3 controller as well.

popatim

Titan
Moderator
try going into the device manager and deleting the external drive and driver.
Then remove the drive and shutdown the pc.
Boot backup after a minute and when windows is done loading reattach the external which should cause the driver to reload.
Let us know if that helped. You might have to do that again but include the usb3 controller as well.
 
Solution

brisa117

Distinguished
Mar 16, 2010
239
1
18,710


Hmm... not going to lie. I didn't think that would work, but it seems to have done the trick! Although I'd love to know why. I can only speculate that I initially plugged it into a USB 2.0 port and it installed it as a 2.0 device? I don't even know if that makes sense. haha. Thanks for the help though! It's working (with the WD supplied cable too!) Major kudos!
 

popatim

Titan
Moderator
From your description it sounded like either the external driver has corrupted or the usb3 driver had. This merely forced windows to delete the corrupted copy it had stored and reinstall it 'fresh'.
I'm glad it worked for you.

In the meantime, let me add that any important files on any harddrives need to be backed up. All drives fail and having an extra copy of your files is the only way to survive it. :)

Cheers!
 

brisa117

Distinguished
Mar 16, 2010
239
1
18,710


I couldn't agree more! This external drive's dual purpose is to be a medium of synchronization between my desktop and laptop, and to be a third backup of sorts. I've been through enough drives failing in my day to know to back things up, and people's weddings are the last thing in the world I would want to lose! YEIKS! Luckily I've caught them all before they've happened (thanks Acronis Drive Monitor) or had backups.
 

mknutso2

Honorable
Oct 17, 2012
3
0
10,510


Had the exact same problem here and was fixed by this. For anyone else having the issue these were my exact steps:
1) Plug the drive into a USB 2.0 port and ensure you can see its file contents in File Explorer.
2) Open Device Manager.
3) Expand "Disk Drives" then right click on the drive corresponding to the Western Digital hard drive (mine says "WD Elements 10A2 USB Device").
4) Press "Uninstall". Continue with the uninstallation process.
5) Unplug the drive.
6) Shutdown.
7) Boot.
8) Plug drive into USB 3.0 port (the driver should automatically install and you should be good to go!)
 

courtneybostdorff

Reputable
Oct 21, 2018
4
0
4,510
try going into the device manager and deleting the external drive and driver.
Then remove the drive and shutdown the pc.
Boot backup after a minute and when windows is done loading reattach the external which should cause the driver to reload.
Let us know if that helped. You might have to do that again but include the usb3 controller as well.

I just had to take a minute to give out the KUDOS to this 9 year old answer that solved my issue! :) Thanks so much for the solution. Saved me from buying USB cords for my Passport Pro AND was the solution to the "can only connect to USB 2.0 and not 3.0" issue. Much thanks and hope everyone in this thread is still with us and are doing as well as we all can right now.