Windows 7 wants to format USB HDD that works in XP

Check disk management when you plug the device in, try switching the drive letter assoceated with the device to a different drive letter on the machine that is having the problem...  Maybe there is a drive letter conflict...

In a machine that *works* check what the drive format is and post back.

I think this is a power problem. If your external usb hdd has a power port (5V), you may try to attach a 5V adapter (be careful with the poles) or an additional-special USB cable that supplies with 5V to the hdd and try. I had the same problem and an external adapter solved my problem. Some power supplys / motherboards does not supply enough voltage/current on USB ports.

VBDotNet:  Beat me to my second question :)   Nice.

Thanks :)

Tried switching drive letter, but it does not appear in the disk management.  The disk management windows takes a very log time to load; with USB HDD plugged in.  I don't think power is an issue.  at a friends suggestion i launched VMware and started an XP VM.  XP loaded the device perfectly!  VMware is runnign on the same laptop having the issue.

The USB HDD is formatted NTFS.

Hmm...
1) What is the partition type ? (GPT, BASIC, dynamic?)
2) Are you sure there is no malware/virus... on your Win7 OS?
3) Did you chkdsk this USB HDD? Any errors?

1) Basic partition
2) i ran AVG free edition and found none (have the latest update applied)
3) i am running chkdsk on the XP machine.  i will advise if any errors are found.

- i am donwloading and installing malware bytes to check for other malware.

Do other usb mass storage devices work in this vista computer (thumb drive, other spinning disk?)

-i have a 32gb flash drive and it works.
-i don't have another spinning usb HDD, but i need to purchase a USB HDD for work.  I will try that on this laptop as well.  could be a few hours.

I would:
* Check my motherboard drivers (to load latest USB drivers)
* Scan with at least 3 different malware scanner (spybot, combofix, sysclean, malwarebytes, spywaredoctor)
* Check Event Viewer (system section) at the time I connected the USB drive that does not work
* Check Device Manager when I connected the drive and see where the device adds itself

-All drivers current
-no malware
-Device Manager: shows as USB device.  Shown as RAW drive for 1/2 sec, then disappears.
-see event viewer log:
Log Name:      System
Source:        Disk
Date:          9/2/2010 10:39:55 AM
Event ID:      51
Task Category: None
Level:         Warning
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      06-CHINGON.SCSEngineers.com
Description:
An error was detected on device \Device\Harddisk1\DR5 during a paging operation.
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
  <System>
    <Provider Name="Disk" />
    <EventID Qualifiers="32772">51</EventID>
    <Level>3</Level>
    <Task>0</Task>
    <Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
    <TimeCreated SystemTime="2010-09-02T17:39:55.500679600Z" />
    <EventRecordID>68333</EventRecordID>
    <Channel>System</Channel>
    <Computer>06-CHINGON.SCSEngineers.com</Computer>
    <Security />
  </System>
  <EventData>
    <Data>\Device\Harddisk1\DR5</Data>
    <Binary>030080000100000000000000330004802D0100000E0000C0000000000000000000000000000000000CC80D0000000000FFFFFFFF01000000580000080000000000200A1240032040000000003C000000D044470B80FAFFFF18CE430780FAFFFF0000000000000000D01BDF0A80FAFFFF90A5B10B80FAFFFF3F0000000000000028000000003F00000100000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000</Binary>
  </EventData>
</Event>

Log Name:      System
Source:        Disk
Date:          9/2/2010 10:39:57 AM
Event ID:      11
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      06-CHINGON.SCSEngineers.com
Description:
The driver detected a controller error on \Device\Harddisk1\DR6.
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
  <System>
    <Provider Name="Disk" />
    <EventID Qualifiers="49156">11</EventID>
    <Level>2</Level>
    <Task>0</Task>
    <Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
    <TimeCreated SystemTime="2010-09-02T17:39:57.541796400Z" />
    <EventRecordID>68340</EventRecordID>
    <Channel>System</Channel>
    <Computer>06-CHINGON.SCSEngineers.com</Computer>
    <Security />
  </System>
  <EventData>
    <Data>\Device\Harddisk1\DR6</Data>
    <Binary>0E00800001000000000000000B0004C003010000000000000000000000082D0000000000000000008FC80D0000000000FFFFFFFF0600000058000000000000000000061208000010000000003C0000000000000000000000C07F410A80FAFFFF00000000000000001010DD0A80FAFFFF0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000</Binary>
  </EventData>
</Event>

It seems like a driver error.
I think it might be the built-in driver in Win7 for this device/controller chip.
Did this hard disk always give this error/behaivour on this Win7 machine, or it was working before?

It was working before, windows update broke it.

I bought a seagate USB hdd and seems to work fine.  I think this is a ms issue.  I have reported it, but do you have solutions?

I think the same (MS-Driver or other software issue).

First thing looks suspicious is the driver for this USB hard disk's USB2SATA or USB2IDE interface chip.

Since they don't release drivers on the manufacturer page (because it's already in windows driver archive) for USB hard disks, I think you must find a way to remove this driver's inf, dll & sys files and copy the same files from another working Win7 computer.

It may be something else too but right now this is all that I can think of...

The other thing you can try is see if they have XP drivers and force Win7 to use them.  XP needed mass storage driver support back in the pre SP1 days and so many manufactures had USB driver packs for them.

It might get you going until you ditch the chassis ;)

-the device has both USB and eSATA connections into it.  
-if i copy drivers from another win7 PC, what files am i looking for?

see my comment above.  i have found a solution to the problem.

.