ExFat formatted external HDD (powered) not recognized on iPad Pro 2021 Gen 5, 12.9"

Regular, “Old Skool” mechanical spinning hard drives WILL need/require additional external power source support for these drives to work with ANY iPad model.

Mechanical, spinning platter hard drives use too much power and cannot be powered by the just the iPad’s own internal power alone.

If you are using an “old skool” spinning platter mechanical hard drive,

Then, you need to purchase the actual, genuine Apple USB-C Digital Multiport adapter from Apple, and plug that adapter into external power using your iPad charge cable and Apple power/charging block!

https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MUF82AM/A/usb-c-digital-av-multiport-adapter

You NEED TO PURCHASE ONE of THESE EXACT genuine Apple adapter above!!!

That is THE ONLY adapters that work!!

Cheaper ( cheap in price and quality ) third party “knockoff” adapters WILL NOT WORK!!!!

Without the additional power to the iPad, “old skool” mechanical spinning platter hard drives will NOT work with any iPads with the either Lightning connector or USB-C

Neither the Lightning port nor USB-C port, alone, cannot convey the,necessary power requirements needed for older mechanical spinning platter hard drives.

For external power sources, you CAN even use portable, carry-able, rechargeable power banks that can be found everywhere online ( try Amazon ) that can power the iPad and external drives, as well.

In addition the external drive needs to be formatted into one of these file/data formats.

You must use a full Mac or Windows PC computer to do the re-formatting of any external drive to use with iPad/iPhone/iOS/iPadOS.

Any type of drive needs to be formatted with a single partition and format as listed below.

Apple Mac computer native format ( either APFS or HFS+ )

FAT 32

exFAT

Apple Website external drive help links here.

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/ipad/ipad1c415e32/ipados

https://support.apple.com/guide/ipad/external-storage-devices-ipad75b7b23f/14.0/ipados/14.0

Good Luck to You!

Tlrsr wrote:

Thank you MichelPm!

Question for you. Why could I see the external drive (as read only) using a non-Apple hub and cables? This was when I first connected everything an the powered drive was still formatted as NFTS.

I have no clue or answer for that.

All I know is if you are having issues with that mechanical drive now, it maybe because the new iPad Pro has insufficient power through the Thunderbolt/USB-C port to sufficiently power that drive and external power is needed.

What happens if you plug a power adapter into that mechanical drive and then try accessing it via a USB-C or Thunderbolt cable?

Also, the drive needs a single ExFat formatted partition.

Best of Luck to You!

iPadOS provides limited support for external Hard Disk storage.

An external HDD can be connected to your iPad with the Apple adapter appropriate for your model of iPad - if the HDD is both partitioned and formatted appropriately (i.e., a single partition - formatted as FAT32, exFAT, APFS or HFS+).  NTFS and other proprietary formats are not supported.

If the current filesystem requires re-formatting, you’ll need to do so using a suitable computer - such as PC, Mac or linux workstation. iOS/iPadOS devices cannot format external device filesystems.

You should also note that iPad is generally unable to provide sufficient power to run an HDD. The 2021 iPad Pro can source a maximum of 7.5W power - which may be insufficient to reliably run a Hard Disk Drive. iPad models with a Lightning port are typically limited to 2.5W or less.

If the HDD does not have its own source of power - then external power can be supplied to the HDD using a connecting adapter (e.g., an Apple Lightning to USB3 Camera Adapter and Apple Charger of at least 12W) - or by connecting both the iPad and HDD to a powered USB hub.

If you iPad has Lightning Port, you will require a Lightning to USB 3 Camera Adapter:

https://store.apple.com/uk/xc/product/MK0W2ZM/A

If you have a 2020 iPad Air4, or a 2018/2020/2021 model of iPad Pro, with a USB-C port, you will in all likelihood need to connect both your iPad and HDD to a powered USB Hub with appropriate USB cables.

If you have an imac/macbook try reformatting it to guid, that the ones the macos uses, then retry with the ipad. It might help

Best of Luck to You!

I still believe that mechanical spinning drive will need to be externally powered.

There is no getting around that.

You'd be better off using fast SSDs with the new iPad Pros, anyways.

SSDs will work when directly connected with no external power needed.

And faster SSDs will be beneficial with the faster Thunderbolt throughput speeds.