[SOLVED] Windows 10 cannot recognize 2.5" IDE HDD via USB adaptor ?

[HarrisonHo1209]

I have an old laptop 2.5" IDE drive, which has XP already installed on it, I wanted to wipe the drive then install some light weight linux distro on it. Which distro I'm using isn't important because the laptop, (which is the only device I have that can access the IDE drive) can neither boot from USB nor is the DVD reader functional, so this pretty much ruins my intentions to install a new linux distro on it. My PC at home cannot access IDE devices, so I decided to get IDE adaptors. Originally I wanted to get an IDE to SATA adaptor, but those aren't available in my region, so I settled for an IDE to USB 3.0 adaptor. The USB adaptor came with a 2.5" IDE adaptor, so I could plug the laptop HDD in and didn't plug in the DC adaptor (since it's a 2.5" drive).

After plugging the USB cable into my desktop, the adaptor lighted up and the drive was spinning. I went to file explorer and the drive was there, I tried to click into it and the green progress bar would reach to the edge but never quite completing. I went to disk manager and the whole thing wouldn't load. I tried CMD and then doing disklist, again, endless loading. I do not know anything about IDE jumpers to mess with it so I just left it alone. I went to task manager and the drive was still there, it even showed to be running at 83% and indicated an actual read/write rate.

Can anyone tell me what I can do to acess this drive, so that I can install linux on it? Or wipe it out before doing so?

 

[rgd1101]

how old is the drive? did you test it on the old laptop to make sure it still work?

 

[HarrisonHo1209]

Yeah, I can boot into xp using this HDD using the old laptop . It's from 2005.

 

[USAFRet]

What specific adapter?
It may need wall power, even though this is a 2.5" drive.

 

[HarrisonHo1209]

https://www.amazon.com/Adapter-FIDECO-Converter-5-25-Inch-DVD-ROM/dp/B077N2KK27

I tried plugging the HDD in with wall power, and without, same results regardless.

I also tried connecting another SATA 3.5" HDD inot the adaptor and it worked, I could access the files inside. So this rules out the adaptor being faulty.

 

[HarrisonHo1209]

Looks like I did it. The problem was not the adaptor, nor was it the drive, but windows 10. Because after connecting the drive to my work PC, which has ubuntu installed, I was able to access and successfully format the drive using the USB adaptor. So if anyone is facing the same problem as I am and you have a linux PC, you can access and format the drive there, or boot into any linux distro with a USB and format the drive from there, so you don't have to install a linux distro just to format this IDE drive.