My MacBookAir (OS Catalina) isn't recognising my LaCie external hard drive, when I plug it in.
What can I do to make the laptop 'see' it, or what can I do to check if the LaCie drive has died. (the light still comes on when I connect it to the laptop)
Thank you
Try different things:
disconnect all externals and do an SMC reset or even a pram zap.
Disconnect the Lacie and wait then reconnect. Unmount before you disconnect any external device.
SMC reset https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201295
you most likely could pull the drive and place it into some other external, preferably non Lacie.
I'd recommend removing the drive, restarting the machine, and then hooking up the drive again.
You could also use Apple's Disk Utility, and see if that program sees your LaCie. If so, try running Disk Utility's "First Aid" option.
Thank you. Disk Utility sees my LaCie hard drive so I ran Disk Utility's First Aid. After running, it reported that the disk was repaired and I was able to see its' files by clicking on the desktop icon which had appeared.
However, when I opened the Finder window, LaCie external hard drive had not appeared in the sidebar.
It seems the drive is ok, but how do I make it appear in the Finder sidebar?
You need to go into your Finder preferences, I believe. It will ask you what all you want to see in your sidebar.
Follow the previous suggestions and also simply try a different cable.
Finder Preferences showed the external hard drive box was unticked; I ticked it and my problem was solved.
Thank you so much. (You are a genius!)
Malcolm Todd
Nah, I just like tinkering with my Mac. I'd run across the same problems you mention. Have a good day.
Using external hard drive
