Zip Drive acting like it's turned off. Reason?

Ok....I'm running a DELL with a Pentium III processor and Windows XP. I bought an IOMega External 250 Drive a few months back and it worked fine 'til about 4 days ago. Now I put in a disk and nothing happens. No green light, no sound from the machine indicating that it's running, nothing. Plus the disk gets stuck inside the machine unless I either unplug it from the back and plug it back in or just restart my system. I've checked the Properties on it and the computer says that it's working properly. I've cleaned out the computer (spyware, registry errors, etc.) using Defender Pro, I've updated the drivers, I've uninstalled and then reinstalled the software, and the thing still won't work. Short of completely losing it and taking a hammer to the freakin' thing, I'm fresh out of ideas. Is there someone out there who can help? Thank you.