P82700 (MD 90250) - External hard drive MEDION - Free user manual and instructions

Brand	MEDION
Model	P82700 (MD 90250)
Product Type	External Hard Drive
Form Factor	2.5 inch portable
Dimensions (approx.)	120 x 75 x 15 mm
Weight (approx.)	150 g
Interface	USB 2.0 (compatible with USB 1.1)
Power Supply	Bus-powered via USB (Y-cable with MAIN and AUX connectors)
Operating Systems Supported	Windows XP / Vista
File Systems Supported	NTFS, FAT, FAT32
Pre-formatted	Yes, ready to use
Data Transfer Rate	Up to 480 Mbps (USB 2.0)
Main Functions	Data storage, backup, portable file transfer
Maintenance and Cleaning	Disconnect cables before cleaning; use dry cloth; no solvents
Safety Precautions	Avoid drops, moisture, dust, direct sunlight; keep away from heat sources; use surge protector
Spare Parts and Repairability	No user-serviceable parts; contact authorised service for repairs
Recycling and Disposal	Do not dispose with household waste; recycle packaging
Warranty	Standard manufacturer warranty (details in documentation)

Frequently Asked Questions - P82700 (MD 90250) MEDION

My computer does not recognize the external hard drive. What should I do?

First, restart your computer. Ensure both USB connectors (MAIN and AUX) are plugged into your PC if needed. If the drive still isn't recognized, try a different USB port or test on another computer.

How do I safely disconnect the external hard drive?

Use the 'Safely Remove Hardware' icon in the system tray. Then wait for the confirmation message before unplugging the USB cable. This prevents data loss.

Which file system should I choose: NTFS, FAT, or FAT32?

For most users, NTFS is recommended because it supports larger files, security features, and better performance. FAT32 is limited to 4GB file size. Use FAT only for compatibility with older systems (e.g., Windows 98).

Can I use this drive with Windows 10?

Yes, though the manual officially supports Windows XP and Vista. The drive uses standard USB mass storage protocol and should work with Windows 10 without additional drivers.

Why does the drive feel warm during use?

It is normal for the hard drive to become warm after prolonged operation. Ensure it is placed on a flat surface with adequate ventilation and away from heat sources.

How do I format the drive?

Right-click the drive in Windows Explorer and select 'Format'. Choose the file system (NTFS preferred) and allocation unit size. This erases all data, so backup first.

What should I do if I accidentally drop the hard drive?

Immediately power it off and check for physical damage. Data may be lost; try connecting to a computer. If not recognized, contact support. Hard drives are fragile and drops can cause irreversible damage.

Can I use the drive on a Mac?

The drive is formatted for Windows. On a Mac, it may be read-only. To use fully, reformat to exFAT or HFS+ (backup data first). However, the manual does not officially support macOS.

Why is the actual storage capacity less than advertised?

This is normal due to the difference between decimal (manufacturer) and binary (operating system) measurement. For example, a 500GB drive shows about 465GB usable. Also, some space is used for file system overhead.

How can I back up my data automatically?

Use Windows Backup or third-party software. The drive can be set as a backup destination. Remember to make regular backups to prevent data loss.

USER MANUAL P82700 (MD 90250) MEDION

Safety instructions .... 1

Safety and installation.... 1

Cabling 1

Electromagnetic compatibility/ Conformity with norms 2

Cleaning 2

Recycling and disposal 2

Data security.... 2

Introduction.... 3

Box contents.... 3

System requirements.... 3

Setting up 4

Connecting the cables 4

Installing the hard disk....5

Before you install your hard disk 5

Partitioning programmes.... 5

Partitioning the drive.... 5

Formatting the drive.... 5

Choosing between NTFS, FAT, and FAT32....6

Deleting hard disks from the system 7

Customer service....8

Requirements for optimal performance: 8

Troubleshooting....8

Do you require additional support? 9

Copying this manual....9

Copyright © 2008

All rights reserved.

This manual is protected by Copyright.

The Copyright is owned by MEDION®.

Trademarks:

MS-DOS ^® and Windows ^® are registered trademarks of Microsoft ^® .

Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

We reserve the right to make technical changes.

Safety instructions

Please read this chapter carefully and observe all listed notes. This will ensure reliable operation and long life expectancy of your product. Keep these instructions with your product at all times. The proper set up, use and care can help extend the life of your product. In the event that you transfer ownership of this product, please provide these instructions to the new owner.

Safety and installation

• Changing the hard disk must only be performed by a person who is experienced in repairing and upgrading PCs.
• Should you not possess the necessary skills, call in a technician.
• Hard disks are extremely fragile. Never drop or shake the hard drive - this could irreversibly damage the data on the hard disk. Be especially careful when transporting the hard disk as we provide no guarantee for this type of damage.
• The hard drive can become warm after prolonged use.
• Never open the casing of your hard disk, if you do the hard disk will no longer be covered by our guarantee.
• Do not let children play unattended with electrical devices.
• The hard disk is not designed for use in commercial applications/situations.
• After transportation, wait until the equipment is at room temperature before turning it on. If there is a large difference in temperature or humidity, damp can build up through condensation and cause an electrical short circuit.
• Keep your hard disk and all connected equipment away from damp and avoid dust, heat and direct sunlight in order to prevent operational problems.
• In order to avoid damage from a fall, place the hard disk on a stable and level surface which does not vibrate.
• For additional safety, we recommend using power connection through a power surge protection unit in order to protect your equipment from power surges and lightning strikes.
• The voltages and interfaces used in the equipment are in line with the low voltage protection guidelines set out in EN60950. Connections to other equipment may only be made using similar interfaces with low voltage protection in accordance with EN 60950.
• Please use our Service Center if you have any technical problems with your hard disk. If repairs are needed, please exclusively use our authorised service partners.
• In the first hours of operation, new devices may emit a typical, unavoidable but completely harmless smell, which will decline increasingly in the course of time. We recommend you ventilate the room regularly, to counteract the formation of the smell.

Cabling

• Arrange cables so no one can walk on or trip over them.
• Do not place objects on any of the cables.

Electromagnetic compatibility/ Conformity with norms

This device fulfils the requirements of electromagnetic compatibility and electrical safety of the following norms:

EN 55022	Information technology equipment - Radio disturbance characteristics - Limits and methods of measurement
EN 55024	Information technology equipment - Immunity characteristics - Limits and methods of measurement
EN 61000-3-2	Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) - Limits for harmonic current emissions (equipment input current up to and including 16 A per phase)
EN 61000-3-3	Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) - Limitation of voltage changes, voltage fluctuations and flicker in public low-voltage supply systems, for equipment with rated current <= 16 A per phase and not subject to conditional connection

EN 60950 Safety of information technology equipment

• On connecting the hard disk, you must keep to the guidelines for electromagnetic compatibility.
• Ensure your hard disk is located at least one meter away from sources of high frequency and magnetic disturbance (TVs, speakers, mobile telephones, etc.) in order to avoid operational problems and data loss.

Cleaning

• Before cleaning your hard disk drive, always unplug all connection cables.
• Do not use any solvents, corrosive or gaseous cleaning products.

Caution!

This equipment does not include any parts that need servicing or cleaning.

Recycling and disposal

Device

Packaging

At the end of its life, the appliance must not be disposed of in household rubbish. Enquire about the options for environmentally-friendly disposal with your retailer.

All packaging and packaging materials that are no longer required can and should be recycled.

Data security

Every time you update your data make back-up copies on an external storage medium. We assume no liability for data loss or damage to data storage units, and no claims can be accepted for damages resulting from the loss of data or consequential losses.

Introduction

Box contents

Please check the contents of the box and notify us within 14 days of purchase if the contents of this box is incomplete. The following should be included with the hard drive:

• External 2.5" hard disk in compact casing
  • USB 2.0 Y-connection cable
• User manual, guarantee documents

System requirements

• Computer PC/AT compatible computer
• Processor Pentium class above 200 MHz
• Operating system Windows® XP/Vista
  • Working memory 32 MB, recommended 64 MB or more
• Connection USB

Setting up

Connecting the cables

Connect the external hard disk to your computer using a free USB port. You can also connect the hard disk to computers with a USB 1.1 port however the speed of transmission will be slower.

Pure diagram of a rectangular object with an arrow pointing to it, surrounded by vertical oval shapes (no text or symbols)

USB connection (Back view)

1. Start your computer and wait until Windows ^® has been fully loaded.
2. Connect the mini-USB connector of the supplied Y-cable to the USB port of your external hard disk.
3. Connect the other end of the Y-cable which has two USB Type-A connectors with the following labels:

The 'MAIN' connector must be connected to your PC / Notebook at all time when in use; the 'AUX' is an addition power source, in case your PC / Notebook does not supply sufficient power strength with one USB port. We recommend to connecting both USB Type-A (MAIN & AUX) connectors to your PC / Notebook's USB ports when using the hard drive.

1. With Windows XP/Vista the hard disk will be automatically recognized and connected.

Installing the hard disk

Note

Your drive has already been set up and so it is not be necessary to reformat or repartition it.

Caution!

Partitioning or formatting a disk drive deletes data. We assume no responsibility for lost data.

Before you install your hard disk ...

We would like to remind you once again that when installing the new hard disk some programmes are used that could cause your data to be irreversibly lost if used incorrectly.

Note

Make a backup of all your data and check that the recovery procedure works.

Partitioning programmes

With Windows ^® XP use the disk management help program in order to install the hard disk. You can find the program in the computer management section of control panel. With some operating systems you must have administration rights to install a hard disk.

With Windows ^® ME the hard disk is installed with the DOS program FDISK. Look under help in Windows for detailed information on using this program.

Partitioning the drive

Partitioning a drive divides the space into different areas which can be accessed as separate logic drives (with letters C:, D:, E: etc.). Read the manual of your operating system to find out how to partition hard drives with your particular system.

Formatting the drive

In order to remove data from the hard disk, the partitions must be formatted.

Caution!

You must be totally sure about which drive letter to enter so that you don't format a drive that contains data you wish to keep.

You can carry out the partitioning using Windows ^® Explorer (right click on the drive and select format).

Read which formatting options you have in the next section.

Choosing between NTFS, FAT, and FAT32

When you use Windows XP and Windows 2000 you can choose between three file systems for disk partitions: NTFS, FAT, and FAT32. Use the information below to compare the file systems. NTFS is the recommended file system for the following reasons:

NTFS is more powerful than FAT or FAT32, and includes features required for hosting Active Directory as well as other important security features. You can use features such as Active Directory and domain-based security only by choosing NTFS as your file system.

It is easy to convert partitions to NTFS. The Setup program makes conversion easy, whether your partitions used FAT, FAT32, or the older version of NTFS. This kind of conversion keeps your files intact (unlike formatting a partition). If you do not need to keep your files intact and you have a FAT or FAT32 partition, it is recommended that you format the partition with NTFS rather than convert from FAT or FAT32. Formatting a partition erases all data on the partition and allows you to start with a clean drive.

Whether a partition is formatted with NTFS or converted using the convert command, NTFS is the better choice of file system. (For more information about Convert.exe, after completing Setup, click Start, click Run, type cmd, and then press ENTER. In the command window, type help convert and then press ENTER.)

In order to maintain access control on files and folders and support limited accounts, you must use NTFS. If you use FAT32, all users will have access to all files on your hard drive, regardless of their account type (administrator, limited, or standard.)

NTFS is the file system that works best with large disks. (The next best file system for large disks is FAT32.)

There is one situation in which you might want to choose FAT or FAT32 as your file system. If it is necessary to have a computer that will sometimes run an earlier version of Windows and other times run Windows XP, you will need to have a FAT or FAT32 partition as the primary (or startup) partition on the hard disk. Earlier versions of Windows cannot access a partition if it uses the latest version of NTFS. The two exceptions are Windows 2000 and Windows NT 4.0 with Service Pack 4 or later. Windows NT 4.0 with Service Pack 4 or later has access to partitions with the latest version of NTFS, but with some limitations: It cannot access files that have been stored using NTFS features that did not exist when Windows NT 4.0 was released.

For anything other than a situation with multiple operating systems, however, the recommended file system is NTFS.

Important

Once you convert a drive or partition to NTFS, you cannot simply convert it back to FAT or FAT32. You will need to reformat the drive or partition which will erase all data including programs and personal files on the partition.

The following table describes the compatibility of each file system with various operating systems.

NTFS	FAT	FAT32
A computer running Windows XP or Windows 2000 can access files on an NTFS partition. A computer running Windows NT 4.0 with Service Pack 4 or later might be able to access some files. Other operating systems allow no access.	Access is available through MS-DOS, all versions of Windows, Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, and OS/2.	Access is available only through Windows 95 OSR2, Windows 98, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows 2000, and Windows XP.

The following table compares disk and file sizes possible with each file system.

NTFS	FAT	FAT32
Recommended minimum volume size is approximately 10 megabytes (MB). Volumes much larger than 2 terabytes (TB) are possible. Cannot be used on floppy disks.	Volumes from size up to 4 gigabytes (GB). Does not support domains.	Volumes from 512 MB to 2 TB. In Windows XP, you can format a FAT32 volume up to 32 GB only. Does not support domains.
File size limited only by size of volume.	Maximum file size is 2 GB.	Maximum file size is 4 GB.

Deleting hard disks from the system

Depending on the operating system, the external hard disk must be disconnected before it can be deleted. Read how this works in the help files of your operating system.

1. Disconnect the hard disk from the operating system if necessary using safely remove hardware wizard.
2. Now pull out the plug and disconnect all the connection cables from the external hard disk.

Caution!

While accessing the hard disk, the hard disk must not be deleted or turned off. This can lead to data loss.

Customer service

Requirements for optimal performance:

• a stable, trouble-free computer
• a correctly installed operating system
  • cables correctly attached to the hard disk
• regular execution of the Windows ^® defragmenter and scandisk programs to remove sources of error and increase the system performance.

Defragmenting your hard drive can take some time (several hours even on a fast PC), and you cannot use your PC during this time. It's advised that you leave your PC defragmenting over night. To defragment your drive in Windows XP:

1. Close down all applications and disable your virus scanner if possible. Also switch off any screensavers.
2. Click Start and then Programs->Accessories->System Tools->Disk Defragmenter
3. Select a drive and click Analyze.
4. Defragment if it is recommended.

ScanDisk is not present in Windows XP. Instead, use Check Disk. To start Check Disk:

1. Open My Computer, right-click a drive, and then click Properties.
2. On the Tools tab, under Error-checking, click Check Now

Sometimes Defragmenter or Scandisk works on 10% or 30% of a hard drive and then hangs. This is usually caused by Windows programs running in the background. If this happens you can force Windows not to run automatic background programmes. To run ScanDisk/Defrag successfully:

1. Go to Start->Run and type msconfig in the Open: box.
2. On the General tab, uncheck all items listed under Selective startup (make sure that Selective startup is selected).
3. Hit apply and OK and restart Windows. This starts Windows with only the basics running; Insures nothing will interfere with ScanDisk and Defragmenter.
4. Run ScanDisk and Defrag.
5. Go to Start->Run and type msconfig in the Open: box. Select Normal Startup.
6. Restart Windows.

Troubleshooting

PROBLEM: Windows stops responding when I disconnect the external hard drive.

ANSWER: This may occur because Windows is trying to access a file that is on external hard drive. Make sure that none of the files on the disk are open when you unplug the drive. Be sure to stop the drive before disconnecting the power or adapter cable to prevent any data loss.

PROBLEM: The drive is not recognized by my computer.

ANSWER: Restart your computer.

PROBLEM: The hard drive does not seem to have as much storage capacity as I allocated.

ANSWER: Check that your operating system and file system support the desired amount.

PROBLEM: ScanDisk reports an unrecoverable error.

ANSWER: The Scandisk program tests drives for errors. If ScanDisk finds a problem and is unable to fix it, there may be a problem with the hard disk

Do you require additional support?

If the suggestions in the previous section have not solved your problem, please contact the hotline. We will try and help you over the telephone. However, before you contact your nearest MEDION Technology Centre, please have the following information available:

• How is your computer configured?
• What additional peripherals do you use?
• What messages, if any, appear on your screen?
- What software were you using when the error occurred?
- What steps have you already undertaken to solve the problem?
- If you have already been given a customer number, please have this available.

Copying this manual

This document contains legally protected information. All rights reserved. Copying in mechanical, electronic and any other form without the written approval of the manufacturer is prohibited.