I know the old drive was formatted with Vista and 7 can't read the old drive.
This is not the case - there is no reason why a drive formatted under Vista would not read in a Windows 7 system - they use the same file system. Can you see the drive via the control panel here:
Control Panel, administrative tools, computer management, storage, disk management.
If it shows there but doesn't have a drive letter right click on it and assign a free drive letter to it.