If you're backing up to an external third-party drive, check with the drive manufacturer to make sure the drive's firmware is up to date. If you're backing up to an external drive, check the formatting of the drive. Time Machine requires that an external drive be formatted like a Mac startup disk: Mac OS Extended (Journaled) with a GUID. My issue is Windows does not recognize my Seagate External Backup Plus External Hard Drive. It appears on my Desktop on my Mac but is not there on Windows. I called Seagate and they informed had me replace my external drive because Windows no longer supports the FreeAgent backup. Tribute to all the healthcare workers of Stanford and across the world from SHC family and friends - Duration: 7:41. Stanford Nursing Recommended for you. I am using macOS(Catalina)10.15.7.My external hard drive is not showing in finder. It shows on Disk Utility but greyed and can not mount from there. I don't want to loose anything from my hard drive. I have tried force mounting from terminal. So, i have followed these commands: diskutil list. Mount /dev/disk2. Ls -la /Volumes/ sudo mkdir. It appears that you have formatted your external hard drive in Mac OS Extended format, which is not supported in Windows. Windows operating systems will support FAT 32, NTFS file format. I would suggest you to follow these steps. Connect the external hard drive to your Mac and copy the important data to the Mac PC.
- Hard Drive Not Detected Mac
- External Hard Drive For Mac
- External Drive Not Showing Up Windows 10
- Mac Not Recognizing External Hd
- External Hard Drive Won't Show Up Mac
- Why Doesn't My External Drive Show Up
Summary
Here is a step-by-step guide for you to fix Seagate external hard drive not showing up in My Computer in Windows 10. Providing that data is valuable, we suggest you try fixes first to make the disk show up in Disk Management, and next take one more step to recover data on the unrecognized Seagate external hard drive with the help of EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard.
'My 320 GB Seagate external hard drive is detected but not showing up in My Computer. What should I do? In Device Manager, it gets detected and in disk management, it shows up as 'unallocated'. Is there any way to fix the issue? If I initialize it, will I lose all the data on the drive? I'm using Windows 10.'
How to fix Seagate external hard drive not showing up in Windows 10
Sometimes, when you plug in your Seagate external hard drive to PC, it cannot be recognized by your PC. As a result, the disk and the folders & files on it then become inaccessible. Actually, there are not the few have experienced such an issue of Seagate external hard drive not showing up in Windows 10 Computer. Next, we will show you how to fix the issue without losing data.
1. Make Seagate external hard drive show up in disk management
The first thing you need to do is to check if it is showing up in disk management. If yes, you can skip to the next step. And if not, you should first update the disk driver to make the Seagate external hard drive recognized by Windows and show up in disk management.
Step 1. In Run (Windows + R), type devmgmt.msc and hit Enter.
Step 2. In Device Manager, next to Universal Serial Bus controller, click '+ (plus)'. Then you'll see a yellow exclamation mark. Right-click and choose update driver software.
Step 3. Click 'automatically search for driver software online..' Where can i download mac os x 10 9.
Step 4. After the process completes, restart your computer and the driver should be automatically installed and loaded in your computer.
Step 5. Go to Windows Disk Management (This PC > Manage > Disk Management), check if the Seagate external hard drive shows as a normal hard disk there.
Sometimes, even the hard drive shows up in Disk Management, it's with strange characters like Unallocated, RAW, disk unknown not initialized, etc. It's detected but not accessible, so this time you must perform data recovery on the hard drive without delay.
2. Recover data from the Seagate external hard drive which is showing but not opening
When you see the Seagate external hard drive listed in the Disk Management window, you can try EaseUS disk data recovery to retrieve your data. It works well on external hard drive data recovery even when the disk is not opening in your Computer.
By going through three short stages, you can easily find lost data on a Seagate external hard drive.
Step 1. Under the 'External Devices', you should see the Seagate external hard drive showing up after it's correctly connected to your computer. Select the drive and click the Scan button.
Step 2. Soon, the software will find more and more data and display the data in the scan results.
Step 3. You can use the Filter feature to quickly locate some specific file types in the results. Select the target files and click the Recover button.
3. Reformat and partition Seagate external hard drive to make it show up in Computer
After Seagate external hard drive recovery, you can then reformat and partition the disk to initialize the disk and make it show up in your computer without losing data.
Step 1. Go to This PC > Manage > Disk Management, right-click the disk partition you need to format and then choose Format.
Step 2. In the pop-up window, you can set file system and cluster size and then click OK.
Note: If you also happen to encounter the flash drive not showing up on Mac, here is the access for online help.
Summary: In this blog, we’ll share different methods to address the ‘external hard drive not showing up on Mac’ issue on macOS Catalina and other lower versions. The methods we’ll cover are:
1. Check USB connectivity
2. Enable visibility of external hard drive
3. Update macOS
4. Repair external hard drive by using Disk Utility
5. Repair external hard drive by using Terminal
6. Erase the external hard drive
7. Replace the external hard drive
Download the free-to-try Mac data recovery software to recover your lost data from external hard drive on Mac.
1. Check USB connectivity
2. Enable visibility of external hard drive
3. Update macOS
4. Repair external hard drive by using Disk Utility
5. Repair external hard drive by using Terminal
6. Erase the external hard drive
7. Replace the external hard drive
Download the free-to-try Mac data recovery software to recover your lost data from external hard drive on Mac.
“Hi friends, when I connected my 2 TB Seagate external hard drive after a long time on my MacBook Air (running on macOS Catalina), the drive did not show up in Desktop or Finder sidebar. This drive has all my important digital memories. Could anyone please help me out to recover my data from the drive? Thanks.”
Hard Drive Not Detected Mac
When you connect an external hard drive to your Mac running on macOS Catalina, the storage drive may not show up on Desktop, Finder, or even on the Disk Utility app due to several reasons.
Common Reasons for External Hard Drive Not Showing Up on Mac
- USB connectivity problem
- Not setting preferences in macOS
- Partition map damage
- Device incompatibility
- Physical damage on a hard drive
The next sections describe multiple troubleshooting methods to fix the ‘external drive not showing up on Mac’ issue on macOS.
1. Check the USB Connectivity
Your external hard drive may not be connected properly to the USB port present on your MacBook Air, iMac, or Mac mini. Try the following steps:
- Try reconnecting the drive to the same or another compatible USB port.
- If that doesn’t fix the issue, try changing the USB cable and reconnect.
- If you have another Mac, then even try connecting the external drive to it.
2. Enable visibility of external hard drive
In macOS Catalina, you need to enable the visibility of external disks. For setting your preferences, do the following:
- Go to Finder > Preferences > General. Under ‘Show these items on the desktop’, check the ‘Hard disks’ and ‘External disks’ checkboxes.
- Similarly, go to Finder > Preferences > Sidebar. Under ‘Show these items on the sidebar’, check the ‘Hard disks’ and ‘External disks’ checkboxes.
- Also, go to Finder > Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility. In Disk Utility, to view all mountable and non-mountable drives, go to View > Show All Devices.
3. Update macOS
Try updating your macOS Catalina to fix subtle issues of external hard drive connectivity. But before that, back up your Macintosh HD by using Time Machine to avoid any data loss. Ensure your Time Machine drive is connected to your Mac. Go to Time Machine > Back Up Now. Once the backup is taken, perform the following steps to update your macOS.
- Go to Apple menu > System Preferences.
- In the System Preferences window, click Software Update.
- In the Software Update window, let macOS to check for updates.
- When updates are available, click Update Now.
- Click Download and Restart. Wait till the update is over.
4. Repair external hard drive by using Disk Utility
When your Mac is not recognizing the external hard drive, use Disk Utility to mount and repair the unrecognized external drive. Steps are as follows:
- Go to Finder > Applications > Utilities. Double-click Disk Utility to launch it.
- If Disk Utility lists the external hard drive in gray, then select your external hard drive from the sidebar.
- From the top pane, click the Mount tab to mount your unmounted external hard drive.
- If the drive is yet inaccessible, click the First Aid tab from the top pane, then click Run to initiate the external hard drive repair process.
- Wait till Disk Utility repairs your external hard drive. If Disk Utility fails, it will show a message that the drive can’t be repaired and you need to back up and replace the drive.
5. Repair external hard drive by using Terminal
When Disk Utility can’t repair your external hard drive, use your Terminal application available in macOS to mount and repair the affected drive. Steps are as follows:
- Go to Finder > Applications > Utilities. Double-click Terminal to launch it.
- At the command line, type diskutil list, then hit Return. Note disk# of the external hard drive.
- Type diskutil mountDisk /dev/disk#, then hit Return.
- Type diskutil repairVolume /dev/disk#. then hit Return.
- When the repair process is completed, go to Terminal > Quit Terminal.
6. Erase the external hard drive
External Hard Drive For Mac
In case the external drive’s data is not accessible due to file system corruption, you can still recover the data by using a data recovery software for Mac.
External Drive Not Showing Up Windows 10
Watch the video—Implementing Stellar Data Recovery Professional for Mac to Recover Unmounted External Drive on Mac.
After recovering the inaccessible data, erase the drive by using Disk Utility to fix any logical issues. Finally, restore the recovered data to the external hard drive.
7. Replace the external hard drive
If your external hard drive is not visible in Disk Utility even if you have chosen the Show All Devices option in the View tab, then the drive may have undergone physical damage. You need to replace the inoperative drive with a new one.
Note: To recover data from a dead hard drive, get in touch with a data recovery service provider.
Mac Not Recognizing External Hd
Tips to Prevent Permanent Data Loss on External Hard Drive
External Hard Drive Won't Show Up Mac
- Implement a 3-2-1 backup strategy (3 copies of data on 2 different storage media with 1 copy offsite) to safeguard against any data loss incident.
- Do not erase the external hard drive straight away if it is not recognized by your Mac unless you recover that data by using a Mac data recovery software.
Conclusion
Why Doesn't My External Drive Show Up
The blog highlighted common reasons with troubleshooting strategies to resolve ‘external hard drive not showing up on Mac’ issue. To perform any critical troubleshooting process, back up your drive. In case of data loss, do not lose hope. Recover your lost data by using a Stellar Data Recovery Professional for macOS Catalina or earlier. The Mac data recovery software supports a variety of storage devices including external hard drives formatted with APFS, HFS+, HFS, NTFS, FAT, and ex-FAT file systems. The software is available for a free trial.