My external hard drive (Freecom Classic SL USB Drive) is no longer being recognised by my windows xp laptop. Today, windows did an automatic update and this may be the root of the problem, as everything was fine beforehand. In the windows Device Manager, my hard drive appears in the USB controller tree with an exclamation mark beside it, reporting: "This device cannot start. (Code 10)"



Ive tried the advice in the troubleshooter, uninstalling then reinstalling the device, and also looked for updated drivers but there appears to be none on the freecom website.



Also, if i switch off the computer and restart, the system hangs at bios. I need to disconnect the drive to get my computer started.



Ive also tried with my desktop computer, also running xp, and the same problem occurs. (This system is also configured for automatic updates).



Any ideas guys?



Cheers.