Essential USB2 not accessible after I attached new Ipod shuffle

I’m not very good on anything but basics but after I couldn’t read my trusty external drive any more (which has all my documents, photos and music, help!), I assumed that the driver was corrupt.  I tried to download a new driver from this website for my 4 year old drive, but the only one I could find was for Windows 98 and not for 2000.  I am currently running the diagnostic program I was able to find.  It currently says under SMART status that status is unknown.  I would be most grateful for ideas  what I can do to see whether the drive is corrupt or the way in which it connects to my computer and how to recover my stuff.  I had hoped that by shutting down the computer and the drive, it would kick back in, but it hasn’t.

Try to run the Diagnostic software that WD has the Website:

http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=940&p_created=1049813869&p_sid=PVoqkzkk&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_srch=1&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9NzcsNzcmcF9wcm9kcz0mcF9jYXRzPSZwX3B2PSZwX2N2PSZwX3BhZ2U9MSZwX3NlYXJjaF90ZXh0PWhvdyB0byB0ZXN0IGEgZHJpdmU!&p_li=&p_topview=1