Acronis not recognizing external USB enclosure T42

[Xaneth]

I posted this over in the T60 forum, but figured I should repost it here:

The only issue I'm running into, is on the T42 (2378). In a DOS mode, booting from Acronis 9.1 disc, the system is unable to recognize the external USB drive. I've also tried a BartPE disc, with Acronis 10, to no avail. With the Bart disc, Acronis 10 doesn't recognize any drives at all, so I'm considering re-building a Bart disc with Acronis 9.1 to see if it helps. I've read in some other posts that there I can get a swap bay drive? Is that recognized by Acronis?

In the meantime, I am able to image a T42 load through a T43 with Acronis 9.1. Works fine on the T42 when done, but I'm not always going to have access to a spare T43 for this purpose.

and a follow up:

FYI, I flashed the BIOS on the T42 to 3.21, which didn't help either. One thing to note is that it does recognize a SATA external USB 2.0 enclosure, but not my PATA external USB 2.0. Again, I'm using a Vantec Nextar3 enclosure in both cases. I noticed this behavior on the T60 as well, with a particular hard drive in the enclosure. I eventually found a drive that wound up working out. I don't mind using a SATA drive/enclosure combo, but need to make sure I can get a T42 load onto the SATA drive. I guess I could clone through a T43 with two USB 2.0 enclosures hooked up? Wierd... If the slim bay works, that might still be a better option...

I ordered a slim bay adapter, but since I don't have a definitive answer on this, I'm just going with a SATA drive and SATA enclosure, but I'm still curious why an IDE enclosure is not being recognized.

Also, it's quite a pain when I'm unable to reach this forum, is there scheduled maintenance that causes it to go offline? I've seen it more than several times that I am unable to get to the site.

[sugo]

On my T42, Acronis recognized my SimpleTech USB HDD (PATA) in DOS without any problem.

[cmarti]

To the OP, After the reboot required by acronis disconnect the usb cable from the laptop and reconect it again just before windows loads.

That help me with a T40 that i had.

Good luck.

[Xaneth]

Thanks for the replies! @sugo, I haven't tried another enclosure (kinda like these NexStar3 enclosures), but that would probably do the trick. For now, I picked up a SATA drive and enclosure, and it's imaging right now, DOS mode. I'll see how the image back looks when I get done, and I'll post again. @cmarti, I don't care for imaging through XP itself, too many issues, and too slow compared. I need something stable that is going to work every time with a blank drive.