On Monday 21 January 2008, Craig White wrote: > The guy from tech > support told me that he was unconcerned and that if the cable appeared > to be undamaged, it in all likelihood wasn't the problem and that in his > view, all commercially available USB device cables (6 foot and less) > were suitable for using with their USB 2.0 drives. > I have seen nothing to disprove that statement, either from my own > experience nor even the anecdotal experience of others. Only Tim's > theories and Tim is long on theories. There was a slip of paper in the box with my 80GB WD PassPort drive that warned to always use the supplied cable, and that the drive might not work with other cables, and to not use extensions. My own experience trying to use another cable, one that was the same length but had been supplied with a USB multi-card reader (SanDisk branded), indicated that this was in fact true, as the PassPort did not spin up with the SanDisk USB 2.0 cable, but would with the supplied WD cable. Please see http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=1336&p_created=1112290978&p_sid=cVO3XkWi&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9Mjk2LDI5NiZwX3Byb2RzPTAmcF9jYXRzPTAmcF9wdj0mcF9jdj0mcF9zZWFyY2hfdHlwZT1hbnN3ZXJzLnNlYXJjaF9mbmwmcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1zdXBwbGllZCBjYWJsZQ**&p_li=&p_topview=1 and http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=1297&p_created=1102368573&p_sid=cVO3XkWi&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9Mjk2LDI5NiZwX3Byb2RzPTAmcF9jYXRzPTAmcF9wdj0mcF9jdj0mcF9zZWFyY2hfdHlwZT1hbnN3ZXJzLnNlYXJjaF9mbmwmcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1zdXBwbGllZCBjYWJsZQ**&p_li=&p_topview=1 -- Lamar Owen www.pari.edu