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Not recognizing external hard drive

I have a 1 terabyte seagate external hard drive that I used to back up my PCs and tried to connect it to my Macbook Pro to transfer the files over from my old computers, but the Mac won't recognize the external hard drive at all. Any suggestions?

Macbook Pro 15" 2.66 ghz, Mac OS X (10.6.4)

Posted on Sep 5, 2010 1:58 PM

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Posted on Mar 9, 2011 7:41 PM

I am having the SAME problem User uploaded file Why is Apple not doing anything about this? I have a lovely LaCie, and I simply cannot get Timescape to recognize it. If someone calls Apple Care, can they please post the solution? (my applecare has expired)

Thanks!
187 replies

Feb 27, 2011 8:37 PM in response to Weeblerock

I'm going to add my experience to this thread: Been using a 500GB Seagate portable external harddrive with my MacBook Pro for about 6 months to back up my MacBook as well as my iMac Desktop. Have had close to a dozen backups successfully performed on each machine. Yesterday, my Seagate went to back up the MacBook, and time machine displayed a message that it could not read the previous backup and needed either to erase it or create a new one (something like that anyway). It backed everything up from scratch -- took about 25-30 mins. After that backup was completed, I took the drive to the imac and attempted to do a backup and the imac was unable to see the drive. I launched Disk Utility on the imac and it was able to see the drive, so I tried to verify the disk. Midway through, DU said "this disk needs to be repaired." So, I began the repair process. After about 10 mins, DU said this disk cannot be repaired. I brought the disk back to the MacBook and same result-- MacBook could not see the disk even though it had just back up the entire thing 30 minutes previously. Figuring the drive was busted, I went out and bought a 1 TB seagate drive. Upon connecting it to the MacBook, it launched an internal app which installed Memeo (apparently Seagates version of Time Machine). Once done, I launched Time Machine and it reformatted the entire drive. Then it backed up the entire disk-- again taking about 30+ minutes to do so. I walked over to the imac and presto-- exactly the same thing happened as before-- it could not recognize the drive. Again I launched DU and it said the disk needed repair, and again the repair process stopped after a few minutes saying it could not repair the disk. Bringing the EHD back to my MacBook, I plugged it in and nada. The macbook will not recognize the drive. It can see it within the Disk Utility program and from within system profiler, but it appears not to see it on the desktop.

Now that I have two apparently non functioning backup drives, I would greatly appreciate any insights you guys could offer. Thanks.

May 4, 2017 3:03 AM in response to Weeblerock

i have used the seagate and Sony external hard disk and i had the same problem. Just try the below things to make it working(it worked for me)

Just try to format your external hard disk with Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Follow the below link for formatting

Format external drives to Mac OS Extended before using with Aperture - Apple Support


or you can try downloading paragon software which will give you read and write access without formatting the external hard disk(But this software is not free).

https://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/


Or


Download a file explorer for windows which will detect the hard disk which have been used on mac

hfsexplorer is one among them which gives window users access to read and write the external hard disk used by mac

Jan 27, 2017 8:58 AM in response to Weeblerock

There is something weird about the cabling with the 1TB Toshiba HD I have. I finally hooked it up to an old USB 4 port bus, without external power, and the bus into the 2015 MBPro and it picked it right up. I can see the previous backups from my older MacBook too, plenty of room on the Toshiba still. So it didn't need me to clean the external HD, or need more power, just a different cable. There is a video out there showing some guy hooking up a longer cord, which also did the trick, don't know where he got the proper cable though. There is a special male end that goes into the Toshiba. Oh, this is exciting, better stop!

Mar 7, 2017 5:32 AM in response to Weeblerock

First, see if they are listed. Issue the command

diskutil list

My relevant output, again using my non-mountable USB as an example is as follows:

/dev/disk4 (disk image): #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER 0: Apple_partition_scheme +15.6 MB disk4 1: Apple_partition_map 32.3 KB disk4s1 2: Apple_HFS True Key 15.6 MB disk4s2 /dev/disk5 (external, physical): #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER 0: FDisk_partition_scheme *8.0 GB disk5 1: Windows_FAT_16 2.1 GB disk5s1 <----- My Problem Child

Eject the disk using the command

diskutil eject disk5

(Obviously use the disk number that associated with your USB device)

Running

diskutil list
again shows the device is gone:

/dev/disk4 (disk image): #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER 0: Apple_partition_scheme +15.6 MB disk4 1: Apple_partition_map 32.3 KB disk4s1 2: Apple_HFS True Key 15.6 MB disk4s2

Now, physically remove, then reinsert the USB drive. Your drive should be functioning again.

Mar 21, 2017 4:24 PM in response to Weeblerock

This worked for me using a MacBook Pro with Retina Screen 2013 and a WD Elements 2TB drive.


1. Relaunch the Finder.

The discs may be mounted and available; however, if the Finder is having troubles displaying them then it may appear as though the discs are not mounted. Press the Option key and right-click the Finder icon in the Dock, and choose "Relaunch".

Mar 22, 2017 3:02 AM in response to Weeblerock

Hi, wanted to share my other solution. I also experienced this problem, not reading external HDD in MAC but working in Windows computer, It also work when you open your External HDD in MAC but no file can be found.


Insert your external HDD in Windows computer.

Go to Exernal HDD drive > right click > properties > Tools

On Tools tab click CHECK in Error Checking.

Wait till it finish checking, after that remove external and try using it in MAC.


It work for me many times. Hope it helps others too.

Mar 23, 2017 4:39 PM in response to MudMan62

Under system Information, I find the following:


USB 3.0 Bus:


Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBXHCIPPT

PCI Device ID: 0x1e31

PCI Revision ID: 0x0004

PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086


Elements 1048:


Product ID: 0x1048

Vendor ID: 0x1058 (Western Digital Technologies, Inc.)

Version: 10.22

Serial Number: 575833314136333031383136

Speed: Up to 5 Gb/sec

Manufacturer: Western Digital

Location ID: 0x14400000 / 3

Current Available (mA): 900

Current Required (mA): 896

Extra Operating Current (mA): 396

Media:

Elements 1048:

Capacity: 2 TB (2,000,396,746,752 bytes)

Removable Media: No

BSD Name: disk1

Logical Unit: 0

Partition Map Type: APM (Apple Partition Map)

USB Interface: 0

Volumes:

disk1s1:

Capacity: 32 KB (32,256 bytes)

BSD Name: disk1s1

Content: Apple_partition_map

Tim's 2TB WD:

Capacity: 2 TB (2,000,262,488,064 bytes)

File System: HFS+

BSD Name: disk1s3

Content: Apple_HFS

Volume UUID: 097F72E0-38C9-324D-9C10-45AADAC23149


When using Disk Utility in Safe Mode, the computer can see the hard drive but cannot repair it. When booting up normally, the hard drive doesn't appear in Disk Utility.

Sep 10, 2017 9:36 PM in response to Weeblerock

* SOLUTION FOUND! * Use your thumb to apply upward (or downward) pressure at the connection point where USB plugs to the drive (you will feel minor vibration when it recognizes and starts up) keep applying the angled pressure as you one-handedly drag all files from this drive to another cause this may be your only chance to get all your files off the problem drive.

Not recognizing external hard drive

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