i have Mandrake 10.0, i recently got a Maxtor 80GB external hard drive USB, and mandrake for what reason won't recognize it, why?

Welcome to LQ.

What format is the filesystem on it?

fat 32 i think

That should be ok. What error do you get when you try to mount it?

the hard drive dosnt show up any where

Can you post the output from running "fdisk -l" as root.

fdisk -l got me this

Disk /dev/hda: 122.9 GB, 122942324736 bytes
16 heads, 63 sectors/track, 238216 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 1008 * 512 = 516096 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 * 1 12190 6143728+ 83 Linux
/dev/hda2 12191 238216 113917104 5 Extended
/dev/hda5 12191 13205 511528+ 82 Linux swap
/dev/hda6 13206 238216 113405512+ 83 Linux


now i am lost

It doesn't look like Mandrake is seeing the usb device.

Do you have the usb mass storage modules loaded? What do you get from running "lsmod"?

Is there any sign of it connecting in the dmesg output? Can you post the output from:
dmesg | grep -E "usb|sd"

[root@localhost /]# dmesg | grep -E "usb|sd
>
[root@localhost /]# lsmod
Module Size Used by
DAC960 74984 0
isofs 35804 0
zlib_inflate 23648 1 isofs
md5 4864 1
ipv6 251392 487
nls_iso8859-1 4896 0
nls_cp850 5728 0
vfat 15680 0
fat 47360 1 vfat
sg 40028 0
st 39992 0
sr_mod 18116 0
sd_mod 17920 0
scsi_mod 117744 4 sg,st,sr_mod,sd_mod
snd-seq-oss 33568 0
snd-seq-midi-event 8704 1 snd-seq-oss
snd-seq 55696 4 snd-seq-oss,snd-seq-midi-event
snd-pcm-oss 53316 0
snd-mixer-oss 19008 1 snd-pcm-oss
snd-intel8x0 34440 1
snd-ac97-codec 59588 1 snd-intel8x0
snd-pcm 97440 2 snd-pcm-oss,snd-intel8x0
snd-timer 26660 2 snd-seq,snd-pcm
gameport 5664 1 snd-intel8x0
snd-page-alloc 12996 2 snd-intel8x0,snd-pcm
snd-mpu401-uart 8320 1 snd-intel8x0
snd-rawmidi 25248 1 snd-mpu401-uart
snd-seq-device 9032 3 snd-seq-oss,snd-seq,snd-rawmidi
snd 55492 14 snd-seq-oss,snd-seq-midi-event,snd-seq,snd-pcm-oss,snd-mixer-oss,snd-intel8x0,snd-ac97-codec,snd-pcm,snd-timer,snd-mpu401-uart,snd-rawmidi,snd-seq-device
soundcore 10560 1 snd
af_packet 22632 2
raw 8640 1
ide-floppy 19776 0
ide-tape 36752 0
ide-cd 41764 0
cdrom 38272 2 sr_mod,ide-cd
floppy 61620 0
8139too 25760 0
mii 5984 1 8139too
ohci1394 35684 0
ieee1394 290480 1 ohci1394
evdev 10496 0
tsdev 8160 0
supermount 39856 1
intel-agp 18364 1
agpgart 32460 1 intel-agp
usbmouse 6208 0
hid 55360 0
ehci-hcd 25572 0
uhci-hcd 31856 0
usbcore 103228 6 usbmouse,hid,ehci-hcd,uhci-hcd
rtc 13640 0
ext3 114216 2
jbd 61976 1 ext3

You missed a quote in the grep command.

Try disconnecting the device, loading the usb mass storage module with:
modprobe usb-storage

If that works then reconnect the device and post the output from:
dmesg | tail

[root@localhost /]# dmesg | grep -E "usb|sd"
drivers/usb/core/usb.c: registered new driver usbfs
drivers/usb/core/usb.c: registered new driver hub
drivers/usb/host/uhci-hcd.c: USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver v2.1
usb 1-1: new low speed USB device using address 2
usb 1-1: USB disconnect, address 2
drivers/usb/core/usb.c: registered new driver hiddev
drivers/usb/core/usb.c: registered new driver hid
drivers/usb/input/hid-core.c: v2.0:USB HID core driver
drivers/usb/core/usb.c: registered new driver usbmouse
drivers/usb/input/usbmouse.c: v1.6:USB HID Boot Protocol mouse driver
usb 1-1: new low speed USB device using address 3
drivers/usb/input/hid-ff.c: hid_ff_init could not find initializer
input: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [Logitech USB-PS/2 Optical Mouse] on usb-0000:00:1d.0-1
usb 2-1: new full speed USB device using address 2
usb 2-1: device not accepting address 2, error -110
usb 2-1: new full speed USB device using address 3
usb 2-1: device not accepting address 3, error -110
usb 2-1: new full speed USB device using address 4
usb 2-1: device not accepting address 4, error -110
usb 2-1: new full speed USB device using address 5
usb 2-1: device not accepting address 5, error -110
usb 1-1: USB disconnect, address 3
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 4
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 4, error -110
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 5
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 5, error -110
usb 2-1: new low speed USB device using address 6
drivers/usb/input/hid-ff.c: hid_ff_init could not find initializer
input: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [Logitech USB-PS/2 Optical Mouse] on usb-0000:00:1d.1-1
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 6
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 6, error -110
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 7
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 7, error -110
[root@localhost /]# dmesg | tail
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 6, error -110
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 7
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 7, error -110
Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
drivers/usb/core/usb.c: registered new driver usb-storage
USB Mass Storage support registered.
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 8
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 8, error -110
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 9
usb 1-1: device not accepting address 9, error -110

It looks like there is a problem with the way it is connecting. Have you got more than one usb controller?

Can you post the output from:
lspci
lsusb -v

Hmmm "error -110"
I had such trouble with this, trying to use a laCie USB drive: in the end I used its firewire alternative connection, and this works very well.

However, this post

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/history/343895

Recommends that you add acpi=noirq to your boot arguements. Perhaps you should try this.

HTH