I contacted Maxtor/Seagate today and they said that that hard drive is most likely shot. I can't think of anything else to do so it looks like I will have to start from scratch when I get the new hard drive. I haven't tried connecting it to a PC computer yet, so I will give that a try and if it doesn't work I'll just send it back and get a new one. If anyone else has any other ideas before I completely give up I am willing to try whatever. Once again, thanks for all of your help.

Hmmm! When I sent my MacBook Pro to have a faulty fan replaced, they took the liberty to completely erase my hard disk! I guess the tech was too lazy to look at the password I supplied him.

I have heard that usually when you send in a Mac for repair, you sign a form saying that you agree that it is okay for the drive to be erased. I think if you want them to preserve your data, they might charge you for this service - it isn't covered under the warranty.

Oh! I knew that! I just couldn't understand why they thought it was necessary to erase the drive to replace a fan!

They might have accidentally damaged the hard drive while doing the repair.

I'd try a software update on your host computer to the next version - OS10.3.4 to OS10.3.8 for instance. That would install drivers and Firewire/USB extensions which will enable your iBook to "see" the external drive. The repair centre probably would have cloned your old HD to your new HD using CCC or something similar and sometimes it doesn't always copy everything exactly as it should ( my experience on a few desktops and powerbooks anyway )
The other thing you could do is just leave the external HD plugged into your computer for as few days and reboot twice a day. More than once has a peripheral magically appeared after a while.
Stewie