Designed for Mac and ready to be used with Time Machine, the 4TB My Passport for Mac USB 3.0 Type-C External Hard Drive from WD can be used to create system backups, store your photos and videos and much more. The drive comes preformatted in HFS+ for Mac and works out of the box; simply plug the drive in and begin transferring your files.
Why would my computer suddenly not recognize my external hard drive? If the hard drive is shot, how can I get to the data?
I had the same problem. When I connected to the computer I heard the noise that it was connected, but it didn't show up in disk management. The drive was vibrating and clearly moving.
I just wanted to say the following: 1) My computer has 3 USB ports. Two of which say SS, the third has a +. Not sure if it matters which USB port, but it may be. 2) I unplugged all devices (e.g., mouse, printer, drive). And shut down the computer. I re-started the computer and left plenty of time to ensure that my computer was ready to go. 3) I plugged it into a different USB port (SS), and it worked.
Thanks for the help.
I have have a 250 GB WD passport which I bought Two years ago.It works fine yesterday untill I formated it using my PC windows 7.I made a back-up on my PC before formatting it but Unfortunately I returned it back to my WD without knowing that It will not be recognized anymore after I reconnect it the next time..Id like to recover my file?device manager shows that it was enabled.I tried to enabled it but it was not possible coz it was causing some trouble thats why it was being enabled...pls I need help on how to enabled it or how to recover my files.thanks
Denise,
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Hello, this is one of the most often asked question here. The most likely reason if your hd uses the ntfs filesystem is that it got corrupted. It can happen often if you are not careful. The most common reason is by disconnecting/unplugging the drive when writing operations are still in progress.
1)Unplug ALL USB devices. 2)Open Device Manager. 3)View, Show Hidden Devices. 4)Uninstall all devices under USB Controllers. 5)Uninstall all devices under Disk Drives that you know are not present. 6)Uninstall all devices under Storage Volumes. Say no to any reboot prompts until you are finished. Also, if a Storage Volume doesn't uninstall, ignore it and move to the next one. 7)If you have a yellow ? with unknown devices, uninstall all of the entries there as well.
reboot pc
Reconnect the USB devices and see if they're recognized properly.
I hope you checked the primary things like : After restarting your pc, if it does not detect your external hard disk using different usb ports, then try to connect another hard external hard disk to your pc, and connect your first hard disk to another pc to clear where the problem is.