Topic: Help! Computer won't recognize R4

[Cooker]

using a borrowed R4... power it up, plug it into my (XPSP2) computer, it comes up as Unknown Device.

Had this happen on two PCs.

Searched on edirol's site - no drivers out there. Read the manual, no help there.

this has to go back tomorrow... any suggestions?

[Brian Skalinder]

Dunno, never had trouble with mine on Win2K.  Shouldn't need any drivers.

Hmmmm...try plugging USB into computer and R4 before powering up the R4?

At a loss...

[bgalizio]

Dunno, never had trouble with mine on Win2K.  Shouldn't need any drivers.

Hmmmm...try plugging USB into computer and R4 before powering up the R4?

At a loss...

No drivers are necessary. The PC should recognize it as an external hard drive/mass storage unit (something along those lines). I always connect USB to computer and R4 before starting the R4 (as Brian suggested) and have never had a problem with my Mac.

[Cooker]

R4 manual says to never do that!

incidentally, both machines that wouldn't recognize it were dells.

[bgalizio]

Err... scratch that. I always connect the USB to the computer, then to the powered on R4. Sleepiness mistake.

[Brian Skalinder]

R4 manual says to never do that!

Only reference I found in the manual regarding PC connectivy indicated to NOT power OFF or disconnect the cable while connected to the PC.  I didn't see any reference to powering ON.  Hmmmm...at any rate, something's obviously screwy, and I'm at a loss aside from my previous suggestion.

Maybe give Edirol support a call? 

[BayTaynt3d]

This sometimes happens when there is a drive conflict when attaching external storage (which is what the R4 is when attached to a PC). Although, considering it happened on 2 computers that might not be the problem. Right click My Computer on the desktop, choose Manage, then click on Disk Management on the left. It's possible that the drive will show up here, but isn't getting assigned a drive letter. If true, then right click the R4's drive on the bottom part of the screen and choose Assign Drive Letter or something like that. Then pick a drive letter that isn't being used. If that was your problem, once you do this, it'll never be an issue again. BTW, this is a handy trick for any external storage that you might be having trouble with, including USB thumb drives.

[Cooker]

thanks everyone. problem never truly solved, but i gave the R4 back to the person i borrowed it from, and they had no problem.

apparently a reboot of the machine while plugged into a powered up R4 did it for him when this happened.