• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

Help otg and data fail

Nightblaster

Lurker
Mar 11, 2017
4
0
hi guys
today i tried to use an otg cable to use a hard disk on my tablet. for a while it ran fine then it my hard disk suddenly stopped working and doesnt show up anymore. i tried to use it on my pc and it sees it just fine. Then i tried to connect my tablet to pc and i saw that it doesnt see my tabley anymore. (it used to). i checked device manager and it only says unknown device. It does charge but i cant transfer any data help please.
 
Just to be clear, this is actually a real USB hard drive rather than just a USB flash drive? Is the hard drive self powered or does it draw power from the host's USB? Because usually battery operated mobile devices like tablets and phones don't supply enough power via OTG to power a USB hard drive correctly, and they need an auxiliary power source. Could the hard drive overloaded the tablet's OTG power and fried something, and that's why the PC no longer recognises the tablet.

I assume you've tried different USB cables to rule out any duffs.
 
Upvote 0
What tablet is it? Does the manufacturer state it can support hard drives via OTG? Usually the power available from OTG on a battery mobile device, like a tablet or phone, is very limited, OK for flash drives, keyboards, mice, i.e. things that don't consume much power. Some USB hard drives have Y-cable with two USBs, in case the PC can't supply enough power for it from a single USB.

It doesn't sound good, in that it worked for an hour, now doesn't and now the PC doesn't recognise it either.

I had a Windows 10 tablet, that that couldn't run USB hard drives via its OTG, not enough power. I have another Android device, a DLP projector which runs on AC power, and that has no problem with USB hard drives.
 
Upvote 0

BEST TECH IN 2023

We've been tracking upcoming products and ranking the best tech since 2007. Thanks for trusting our opinion: we get rewarded through affiliate links that earn us a commission and we invite you to learn more about us.

Smartphones