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My iMac won't recognize Seagate Free Agent GoFlex external harddrive since I upgraded to El Capitan 10.11. So TimeMachine does not work. I do not see the Seagate icon on my desktop or in the Applications menu, but the harddrive is running and it is properly connected to the iMac.
iMac, OS X El Capitan (10.11), won't recognize external hard drive
How is the External Hard Disk formatted? If it is new and has been formatted for Mac OS Extended (Journaled) then it's fine. If not it's not formatted correctly! Once we know then we can begin some troubleshooting steps.
Did you perhaps install the "Seagate Tools" that came with the drive?
If so, check with Seagate as to how to uninstall them. There have been
numerous issues over various OS X updates where drive vendor "tools"
cause external drives to disappear or otherwise become unreliable.
This has happened for Seagate "tools" as well as Western Digital "tools".
In reality, they are not required and should never be installed.
I had the same problem. Installed the Dashboard software from the Seagate website and after the required restart after installation, voila(!) the drive appeared on the desktop. Hope it works for any and everyone who runs into this same problem. Years of data was at stake for me.
mac won't recognize Seagate Free Agent GoFlex external harddrive with El Capitan 10.11
