USB Gloves

Problem accessing external enclosure (USB) laptop hard drive.?

I bought a SilverStone external enclosure for laptop SATA hard drive, which has an option to plug in using USB. I have lost the instruction manual and cannot find the manual online anywhere. So, I did what I thought was common sense. I put in the hard drive into the enclosure (yes, it fits like a glove). Then I plug in the USB cable (it has two ends. I'm guessing one is for power and one is for data). I have 3 USB inputs on my computer and have tried various combination on the slots, but it will not access. No icon appears at the bottom. No message comes up when I plug it in. I don't see it listed as a hard drive in My Computer. I can hear the external hard drive spinning, so it has power (plus the blue light on the external hard drive is on). I have 2 different loose SATA hard drives and neither of them work. One is unformatted, and the other is formatted NTFS. Do I need drivers? What am I doing wrong? I just want to access data on my laptop drive. So I found the instruction manual for this enclosure. It is a SilverStone MS05 (http://www.silverstonetek.com/downloads/Manual/EN-MS05-Manual.pdf). It tells me to do exactly as I explained above. (1) open the enclosure (2) insert the SATA drive until it locks (3) close the enclosure (4) plug in the USB connector to the back of the enclosure, and connect the double-split end USB cable to the laptop. It does not work. My USB ports work with my mouse and my keyboard, so the USB ports are okay. The enclosure lights up (and the manual says the two USB cable provides sufficient power) and the hard drive is audibly spinning. Yet, I cannot access it. I do not see the drive in My Computer nor diskmgmt.msc. Any suggestions? http://www.silverstonetek.com/downloads/Manual/EN-MS05-Manual.pdf

Public Comments

1. You are right, in that one of the ends is for power, and one is for Data... you just don't need to always use both. The procedure is specific for when you need to use both. If you need to use both, you first plug both of those USB into two USB ports in the computer THEN you hook the cable up to the hard drive... however, this is only IF you need the additional power necessary. When you examine the cable, it should strike you which is for data, and which is the extra for power. Like, one end will be for the drive, then the next end on the cable is for data, and the last one will almost look extra, and be for additional power. you should only have to use that one for additional power if hooking it up normally doesn't work. But in general, plug the cable into the computer first, then into the drive.
2. The laptop SATA drives you are trying to use might require more power to operate than the USB ports supply. You should post the drives' manufacturer and model number, as well as the model number for the SilverStone enclosure so we can look up the relevant information.