I recently bought a Philips spe3051cc external hdd for backup and everything worked fine for a while.
 
I've always had the drive turned on prior to boot, but one day I forgot. And since then, it hasen't been recognized by my computer at all. The disk speeds up, but then suddenly clicks and stops. Repeats.
 
It was pretty cheap for a 500gb drive, but what I didn't realize was that it somehow only supports up to Windows XP. I never thought of a new hdd not working with a mainstream windows build. Funny. Guess that's the reason it's cheap.
 
Is there even firmware in a hdd? Is there anything I can do to make my hdd comply with Vista? Hacks, patches, anything?