I'm hoping someone can help. We have a relatively new computer with Vista. Old computer had XP. Additionally, we utilize Maxtor Personal Storage 3100 for an external drive. We figured this would be an easy way to transfer data files from old to new. Unfortunately, that hasn't been the case - at least not yet.

New computer recognizes external drive BUT it doesn't display any files or folders that were created / modified after 2005. Went back to the old computer and everything displays as expected. Obviously, this seriously impacts the ability to transfer data files. I've been trying everything I can think of - and searching around for similar issues - but so far no luck.

Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks!

vista is written in a new code.
probably won't read much from 2005.
for instance, office 2000/2003 can't open files on office 2007.
and vice versa

Sounds like the issue I just had. I took my ext USB drive (WD IDE in a Vantec case) with 200GB of music to a friend who had just acquired that day a new Vista machine. It mounted just fine but... no folders. I checked on drive properties and the space was being used, so the files were still there. But even odder is that running a search on that drive found the files! Yet, no folders in either Windows Explorer (or whatever Vista calls it) or any other app.
Nonetheless, when I plugging it back into my XP machine every thing was there (thank God!)

If any one has an explanation for this I'd be gratified to hear it.

I had no problem accessing my external HD...
Have you tried setting your folder options to show hidden files?
I did notice one thing odd with mine, maybe its related, maybe not.
What I have happening is that my files had all become read only when I tried accessing them from Vista.

so maybe it is just something random such as your files becoming hidden

I hope this simple suggestion can help you all.