External Hard Drive Not Showing Up – How to Fix and Recover Data

"My Seagate external hard drive is not showing up. I just want to get back some important data from Seagate external hard drive. Is there any method to fix these problems with ease? What should I do to retrieve the files?"

When the external hard drive is not showing up, it does not mean files in the hard drive are lost. You can get a long list of fixes to get rid of the problem, such as check the drive, USB connector, USB cable, computer and more. What should you do if external hard drive still does not show up? Here are the 6 ultimate solutions you should know after you checking for all aspects.

External Hard Drive Not Showing Up Windows

Possible reason - Compatible Issues with Data Format

When the external hard drive is not showing up on Windows 10, which works with Mac previously. Mac automatically format the external hard drive to HFS format. Since Windows does not support HFS format, it is the reason that external hard drive does not show up in computer.

1. Download and install HFS open source program on your computer. After that launch the program.

2. Connect the external hard drive on Windows to check whether computer recognizes external hard drive now. As for the new drive, you can format that to NTFS format instead.

Tips: Since the NTFS of Windows and HFS of Mac OS are not compatible with each other. If you have both Windows and Mac, it is recommended to format new external hard drive to exFAT file system. (See how to write to an NTFS drive on Mac)

Common solution - Run the Hardware and Device Troubleshooter

When you have some issues with hardware or device, you can run Hardware and Device Troubleshooter in order to identify and resolve the problems, including the external hard drive is not showing up on Windows 10/8/7. The automated troubleshooter will identify the problem and solve it.

1. Open the "Control Panel" of your computer, you can click the "Configure a device" from the "Hardware and Sound" option.

2. Once you launch the Hardware Troubleshooter, you can choose the "Apply repairs automatically", which will fix the detected problems automatically.

3. Check the issues detected on Windows and click on the "Next" option to run the "Hardware and Device Troubleshooter" to scan and fix the issues.

Does External Hard Drive Show Up in Disk Management?

Does external hard drive show up in Disk Management? If it is not a compatible issue for file system, you can check whether Windows detects the external hard drive you plugin. As for the Mac users, you can use Apple's Disk Utility instead.

1. Click on the "Start" menu, type "cmd" command line and press Enter. Once the "Command Prompt", you can enter "devmgmt.msc" commands into the Run dialog.

2. Locate the external hard drive under Disk drives. If it does not exist, you can click on the "View" option, select the "Show hidden devices" to check the external hard drive.

If it exists, change drive letter and path

If you find the error message as "unallocated space", you might want to create a new partition to inside the unallocated space. Just assign a drive letter to the USB or external hard drive in Disk Management as below to fix external hard driver not recognized issues.

1. Right click the partition of the external hard drive.

2. Select the "Change Drive Letter and Path for FLASH DRIVE". Choose the "Assign the following drive letter" option.

3. Add a drive letter to the external hard drive. Then you can plugin the external hard driver to find whether it works now.

Still does not work, update the drivers for external hard drive

If you can locate the external hard driver in Disk Management, but not My Computer or File Explorer, you can update the drivers for the external hard drive with the following process.

1. Press the "Windows" and "R" button to enter "devmgmt.msc" on the run box. As for the case, you can launch the "Device Manager".

2. Click the "Scan for hardware changes" icon on the menu. After that right click the external hard drive to choose "Driver" option from Properties.

3. Update the external USB drive by clicking the "Update Driver…" option to update the driver software for this device.

Driver update also works to fix your green screen death on Windows computer.

Ultimate Solution: Recover Data from External Hard Drive

What should you do if you have to format external hard drive in order to fix the issue? If you have some important data in the external hard drive that does not show up, you have to retrieve the data from the hard drive first. Aiseesoft Data Recovery is powerful and safe data recovery to get back almost all deleted/lost files from the hard driver.

1. Retrieve files from computer, memory card, Flash drive, digital camera, hard drives and removable drives.

2. Support multiple data types, such as image, documents, audio, video, email, ZIP files and more in various formats.

3. Recover data for different situations, Deleted File Recovery, Hard Drive Recovery, Crashed PC/Mac Recovery and Partition Recovery.

4. Efficient data recovery with Deep Scan feature to ensure all the deleted files can be retrieved.

How to Retrieve Lost Data from External Hard Drive

Step 1 Download and install Aiseesoft Data Recovery on your computer. Connect the external hard drive and launch the program to detect files.

Step 2 Choose the "Check all file types" to select all the file types and select the formatted external hard drive to retrieve data files. After that click the "Scan" button to scan and retrieve data.

Step 3 Choose the retrieved data from external drive. All the deleted and lost files will be listed in the user interface. You can use the filter feature to locate the desired files with ease.

Notes: It is recommended to use the "Deep Scan" mode to make sure you can restore all possible results. It takes a longer time to scan with the "Deep Scan" mode.

Step 4 Just one click on the "Recover" button, which you can retrieve the selected files back to your computer. After that click the "Open Folder" to get the deleted files.

Conclusion

What should you do when external hard drive does not show up? As for the new hard drive, or hard drive first used in the computer, you can make sure the file system is correct. After that you can use auto fixes to get rid of external hard drive is not showing up issues. If it does not work, check whether the hard drive is available in disk management, which you can find solutions for different situations. When you have to format the hard drive or there is any lost file for the external hard drive, Aiseesoft Data Recovery should always be your first choice.