Can't see external hard drive in 10.3.9

My friend has a MacBook G3, using OS 10.3.9. I tried to give her an external hard drive, a Western Digital pocket drive (runs on USB power). But, the drive won't mount on her desktop, and we can't even see it using Disk Utility on her computer. The drive's powerlight is ON after we plug it into the USB port, but we just can't see the drive, not even to format it.
It works fine on my MacBook running OS 10.5.6, and I reformated it several times, with several different format options, on my MacBook. But no matter what we do, the drive is not visible on the G3, even though it is getting power from the G3 USB port.
Any suggestions?

Look at these links.
USB and FireWire Quick Assist
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1151?viewlocale=en_US
Common fixes for USB device issues (unrecognized, etc.)
http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20070824012114701
Try the above fixes first. It's possible that there's not enough power in the USB port to spin up the HD. Although usually you will get an error notification. You could get an AC powered USB hub to connect to the PB & then to the HD if this is the situation.
 Cheers, Tom

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