Puzzle - External HDD Disk Management Error

I have been searching all night for help on this...any suggestions would
be greatly appreciated...

Windows Vista Home Premium 64 will not recognize external HDD
(eSATA/firewire/USB2). I started with eSATA, but that didn't work. I
tried rebooting with HDD on, etc. The disk didn't show up in Device
Manager or in My Computer, Disk Management, etc. So, I thought I'd make
sure the other connection types worked.

When I connected with firewire 400, it showed up in Device Manager
after a scan as "Disk Drive" or something generic like that. I still
couldn't make much traction because all the posts mentioned Disk
Management steps to take, but it didn't even show up there even after
rescans and refreshs.

So, I tried the USB interface. Windows immediately recognized it as USB
device and installed drivers like "normal" for USB devices. But, it
still wasn't in My Computer. This time, however, it was present in Disk
Managment but shows as Disk 1 with "Unknown" and "Not Initialized" in
box. When I right click to initialize disk, a "Initialize Disk" dialog
comes up asking for MBR or GDT partitioning. I click ok on MBR option,
then Logical Disk Manager throws the error "Incorrect function."
Details: BIOS recognizes the drive as an external HDD and I recently
installed x64 SP2.

Does anyone have any suggestions? I would be quite grateful for any
help.

Some of my Hardware:
External HDD: Simpletech Pro Drive 1 TB (eSATA/FW/USB interfaces)
Asus P6T Deluxe V2 Mobo
Intel i7
Internal HDD: SATAII Seagate 500GB x 2 in RAID 1
6GB RAM

Has the disk been formatted yet?
If yes with what format?
If not doesn't disk manager give you the option to format it?
Did the drive come with any of its own Vista 64 bit drivers?

My mobo has eSATA connectors, but I've never used them. I've never run a
true external HDD, and have NO experience with Firewire, or with USB
external drives (except flash drives). But I've often hooked my internal
drive cables to an HDD sitting outside the computer case so that the
computer thought it was internal.

Have you tried connecting the internal SATA cables to your external HDD? Or
tried putting the HDD inside temporarily, just long enough to use Disk
Management to partition and format it?

The correct sequence, in my experience, is to first see that the HDD is
recognized by the BIOS - that it shows up on the POST screen at startup.
Second, it should show up in Device Manager. And, third, you should be able
to see it in Disk Management, and create at least one partition and format
it. THEN you should see it in Computer and Windows Explorer.

Remember that HDDs NEVER show up in Computer and Windows Explorer. You'll
never see "Disk 0" there. You'll see only entries like "Drive X:" - which
refer to a partition (volume), NOT to a physical drive. Similarly, you
won't see Drive X: in Device Manager; it will show each physical HDD. Disk
Management will show both physical drives - once they are recognized by
Windows - and logical drives - after you have created them.

So:
Step 1: Be sure that your HDD appears in your BIOS.
Step 2: Be sure that your HDD appears in Device Manager.
Step 3: See if that HDD appears in Disk Management. If so, create at
least one partition and assign a "drive" letter.
Step 4: See if that "drive' appears in Computer.

Your problem seems to be in Step 3. Have you tried the Help file. The Help
file in Disk Management has a ton of good information, but it has at least
three drawbacks: (1) It covers the whole Microsoft Management Console, so
we have to focus on just the Disk Management parts; (2), it covers much more
sophisticated matters than most of us need, such as GPT and dynamic disks;
and, (3) it is organized as a reference, not a tutorial, so we can't just
read it linearly like a text book. But, given all those, if you search the
Help file for "foreign", you should find out how to recognize and install
your new HDD.

Since you really want to use eSATA, please tell us what your BIOS shows when
you connect your new HDD that way. Does your mobo have eSATA drivers built
in, or are they on a CD that you need to install?

Yes, it appears as a USB connected external hard drive in the BIOS and
device manager sees it as an Ext Hard Drive Dsk or something like that.
It looks like everything's fine to that point, but for some reason, Disk
Management "Initialize Disk" is giving an error "Incorrect Function".

I do not think the drive is formatted/partitioned at all. There is no
such option to format or "Import Foreign Disk" or anything besides
"Initialize Disk" (which gives an error) and Properties and Help on the
right-click menu in disk management for the drive. Reading the help
file a little, I tried some random things, but there is a lot there and
little seems to apply to my situation. I used diskpart to list disk
and saw that it is listed as disk 1 and is online but has 0 GB.

Perhaps I can try to use command line DOS programs to form
partition/format the disk?

My strategy right now is try to do anything I can to get it
partitioned/formatted with the USB and work on the eSATA once that is
done. I imagine it will be fine then, but if not, I may try the
suggestion about connecting it directly to the mobo SATA.

Any other ideas? Need more info? Please help!

Ok, I tried using diskpart to create partition primary on the disk. It
gave the same error: Diskpart has encountered an error: Incorrect
function. See system Event Log for more information. The event viewer
shows a virtual disk service error, but the code has no associated
interpretation on the microsoft website.

A "virtual" disk error? That doesn't sound like what you are trying for.

Is this with the disk connect to internal SATA cables? Or USB?

As I said, I have little or no experience except with internal HDDs, so I
hope someone with more experience with external drives will jump in here.

same to me. as I used Vista 64 bit on my asus Z83 SV notebook with Sp1 and
Hotfix KB 950186, my external WD esata worked well. After installing SP2, the
ext disk is not recognized anymore. New esata driver from jmicron doesn't
help. I thought it is the problem of windows vista 64 bit sp2,
because on my other Notebook asus z96hm with windows 7 it works well. With
the Same jmicron driver.
So i think microsoft programmers and engineers are too busy preparing the
launch of windows 7. they don't care of windows vista anymore.
Vista is not a finished product. I am really regreting for buying a vista
ultimate license although it is only an upgrade from the home premium.