USB Hard Drive not showing up in AirPort Utility

[weili]

I have been using this AirPort Extreme for over two years now and it's been working fine. I finally decided to buy a self-powered USB hard drive so I can share it over the network. However, after I unpacked the hard drive, connected it to my Mac and reformatted it to HFS+ Journaled and GUID. I plugged the hard drive into my AirPort Extreme's USB port and waited. I looked in my AirPort Utility and saw nothing in the disk list.

I spent hours searching online and discovered that I am not alone in this problem, although solutions are rare. I did try one solution where I hooked up the USB hard drive to a powered USB hub and the hub into AirPort Extreme. It actually worked once and after I rebooted everything, even though the hard drive still showed up in the disk list, no computers can connect to it. Although if I connect the hard drive directly to a Mac, it would still work perfectly.

Having a USB hub is not a long term solution not that it's working anymore anyway. I would appreciate any suggestions you may have, thanks!

 

[skorpien]

Does the hard drive have a hole to plug in a power adapter? It seems that the USB port on the Extreme is too underpowered for that USB hard drive. If that's the case, the only way to get it working is to provide power via an external source (either a powered hub or an adapter). If there is no way to use an adapter with your drive, you may need to purchase one that can.