- My Passport For Mac Not Showing Up On Windows
- My Passport For Mac Is Not Showing Up On My Desktop
- My Passport For Mac Help
- My Passport For Mac Is Not Showing Up
The defect is probably in the WD My Passport Ultra controller. These all in one drive and controllers from WD, Seagate, etc. Are notorious for 'crapping out'. Often they have controllers that have the USB and SATA interfaces in one circuit board so if they die, both the drive and the circuit board, are useless. Equipped with USB-C technology, the My Passport Ultra for Mac portable drive offers an easy way to expand your storage. Learn more: https://www.wdc.com/produ. There's an important difference between these WD drives apart from formatting and colour, which theluggage alluded to - My Passport for Mac works with USB 2 and 3; My Passport Studio works with FireWire 800 and USB 2. So if you want to use USB 3 you need the silver Mac version.
I have a 'my passport for mac' that is not showing up on my macbook pro after connecting it. I had tried several things such as go through Disk Utility and see if it recognised it, but again no luck. Tried resetting NVRAM, but again not look. The same thing happens when I connect it to my new imac updated to the latest version of Catalina 10.15.5. Check the box ‘External Disks’. It’s under the General tab. Finder Preferences Show External Disks. Now you open up a piece of software on your Mac called Disk Utility. You’ll use Disk Utility to format your WD My Passport drive. You find Disk Utility in the Applications folder on your Mac. Applications Folder In Dock.
Summary: WD My Passport for Mac is not showing up Mac? Follow the tutorial in this article to fix WD My Passport not working issue and recover data from unrecognized WD My Passport for Mac.
Everything has flaws, even the WD My Passport for Mac drive that you used for years.
It happens frequently that:
- WD My Passport won't show up when connecting to your Mac computer
- WD My Passport is greyed out in Disk Utility
- WD hard drive's light is on but not working after macOS Big Sur update
- My Passport WD external drive won't open the password application on M1 Mac
- Mac didn't unlock the My Passport WD drive but asking for WD Drive Unlock application
- My Passport WD becomes encrypted or unreadable on your Mac
Either way, your important data on this drive will become inaccessible and concerns you a lot.
If the WD My Passport is not showing up on Mac desktop, Finder or Disk Utility after connecting to your Mac, how to find it and make it work? If you can't see files from WD external hard drive on Mac, how to access data? You'll get answers here.
Troubleshoot WD My Passport not showing up on Mac issue
Usually, malfunctioned USB port or Mac computer, the broken USB cable and some hardware problems could make WD My Passport not showing up.
You can do the following basic checks before go further troubleshootings.
- Safely remove the WD My Passport and reconnect it to the USB port. Try quickly plug and slowly plug, which sometimes just works for no reason.
- Check whether the USB cable or USB port is bad by connecting other hard drives to this USB port or cable and see if that makes a difference.
- Reboot your Mac computer to see if your WD My Passport drive is not showing up in Disk Utility/Finder or not.
- Connect the WD My Passport to another Mac computer or Windows PC, which will find out if it is the incompatible file system of the drive that makes this WD My Passport undetectable.
How to fix WD My Passport not showing up on Mac issue?
If the WD My Passport for Mac still does not work or not show up on Mac after the basic checks, go ahead to try out the solutions as below to make it show up on Mac.
Solution 1: Check Finder Preferences
If your WD My Passport is not showing up in Finder and desktop, it's possible that the configuration of the Finder Preferences is stopping your WD My Passport drive showing up.
In other words, you didn't allow the connected hard drives showing up in the Finder or on the desktop.
Now, follow the guide below to set Finder Preferences and make the WD My Passport for Mac show up in Finder or on the desktop.
- 1. Go to Finder > Preferences > General tab.
- 2. Tick the 'External disks' option to show the WD My Passport for Mac on the desktop.
- 3. Go to Sidebar tab, tick 'External disks' under 'Devices' to show your WD My Passport for Mac in Finder.
Solution 2: Check My Passport for Mac in Disk Utility
If the WD My Passport for Mac drive is still not showing up in Finder or on the desktop, you can see whether it is showing up in Disk Utility or not.
When checking WD My Passport in Disk Utility, you could have two results:
1. Your WD My Passport drive is detected and showing up in Disk Utility, but it is greyed out or not mounting.
2. Your WD hard drive is not recognized, so it's not showing up in Disk Utility at all.
Here, we'll show you solutions to case 1.
Method 1: Mount WD My Passport for Mac in Disk Utility manually
Sometimes, hard drives cannot be automatically mounted in Disk Utility, even though Mac has detected the hard drive. So it's possible that you'll see the WD My Passport for Mac drive not mounting in Disk Utility. In this situation, you can manually mount the hard drive.
- 1. Go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.
- 2. Click 'Show All Devices' in View option at the left corner of Disk Utility.
- 3. Select your WD My Passport for Mac drive from the left sidebar and click the Mount button on the top of Disk Utility window.
Instead, you can also click on the mount icon beside the drive to mount it immediately.
Method 2: Repair WD My Passport for Mac drive with First Aid
If you can't mount the WD My Passport for Mac manually, there should be some file system problems in this drive.
But don't worry. There is a native repair tool called First Aid in your Mac computer's Disk Utility, which is able to analyze and repair basic hard drive problems especially with file systems and catalogs, extends, volume bit maps. You can follow the instructions to fix this problem.
- 1. Go to Disk Utility.
- 2. Select the WD My Passport for Mac.
- 3. Click First Aid on the top of the Disk Utility window.
- 4. Click Done when the reparation finishes.
Solution 3: Install the Latest WD Utilities
This has been discussed a lot that Western Digital hard drives not working after Big Sur update or when connecting to an Apple Silicon M1 MacBook Air.
Typically, you'll receive a similar message as follows and you can't open or unlock your WD drive (My Passport):
If you have used WD Utilities or have created a secure password to keep others from accessing the files on the drive, you have to password unlock the drive (unless you enable auto unlock for this computer) each time you:
- Shut down or restart your Mac
- You disconnect and reconnect the WD My Passport
- Mac wakes up from sleep mode
And you have to unlock it with passwork though you have uninstalled the WD My Passport software from your Mac.
To fix that Western Digital My Passport hard drives not working or unlock (only if you know the right password) after Big Sur update, simply download, update, and install the latest WD Discovery Utilities for macOS 11 Big Sur.
2.2 definition of derivativeap calculus. If unfortunately,you can't remember the password, you can only reformat the WD drive (My Passport for Mac) to make it work again, at the expense of data loss.
Solution 4: Erase/Reformat My Passport for Mac
If First Aid was unable to repair the errors in the WD My Passport, meaning the disk file system has been damaged, which is quite common, then you have to fix the WD My Passport for Mac not showing up on Mac problem by reformatting.
The situation is, reformatting will assign a new file system but will erase all your data on this drive as well.
To avoid the loss of important data, please make sure you have a backup copy of data. Without a backup? It's not necessarily the end of the world. You can at first recover lost data from the WD My Passport for Mac with professional Mac data recovery software, like iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is free hard drive data recovery software for Mac that is able to recover deleted files on Mac, recover lost data from formatted, inaccessible, corrupted, unmountable, unreadable hard drives, USB flash drives, SD cards, memory cards, etc.
It's compatible with macOS Big Sur 11/Catalina 10.15/Mojave 10.14/High Sierra/Sierra 10.12 and Mac OS X 10.11/10.10/10.9/10.8/10.7, on both Intel- and M1-based Macs
1 Recover lost data from My Passport for Mac with iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac
- 1. Download and install iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac on Mac.
- 2. Launch iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
- 3. Select My Passport for Mac and click 'Next' button to scan all data on this drive.
- 4. Preview the searching results, choose files you need, and click 'Recover' to get them back.
2 Reformat My Passport for Mac in Disk Utility
After recovering data from this drive, you can now courageously proceed to erase your WD My Passport for Mac drive with no fuss.
- 1. Go to Disk Utility.
- 2. Select the WD My Passport for Mac drive in the left sidebar.
- 3. Click Erase on the top of the Disk Utility window.
- 4. Complete the information for your drive (such as new format, partition scheme, and so on) and click Erase.
What to do if the WD My Passport drive is not recognized/detected?
If My Passport for Mac hard drive is not showing up in Disk Utility at all, it means the WD hard drive is not recognized. Very probably, your My Passport for Mac may have some hardware problems. It's better to send it to a local reparation center.
Wd My Passport Ultra Mac
Understanding why My Passport drive not showing up on Mac
Sometimes, an external hard drive not showing up on Mac just because the USB cable or the USB port on your Mac is bad. In addition, the following reasons may also lead to WD My Passport for Mac not showing up or not working.
- Recent macOS update issue
- System failure
- Virus infection
- Motherboard issue
- WD My Passport drive damage or corruption
Bonus Maintenance Tips for WD My Passport drives for Mac
Apparently, most hard drive not showing up issues are caused by unsafe ejection and sudden power outrage. In order to maintain your WD My Passport for Mac in good condition, you should pay attention to:
- Make sure that your WD My Passport doesn't become physically damaged.
- Always safely and properly eject the WD My Passport for Mac drive after using it.
- Don't just unplug the USB cable, on the contrary, unmount your drive by right-clicking (control-click) on the icon on the Desktop or in the Finder and choose Eject.
- Properly use WD software like WD Drive Utilities, WD Backup software ( to back up important files to your My Passport drive), and WD Discovery ( to organize and share your files to the My Passport drive to backup your online social life).
Summary: This article analyzes why the WD My Passport for Mac drive is not mounting/working on Mac and how to fix this issue. If you worry about losing data, you can recover data from the WD hard drive with iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac at first.
This page will analyze why WD My Passport drive won't mount on Mac, and provides 7 possible solutions to this issue.
- 1. Show the mounted WD My Passport for Mac hard drive on Mac destop
- 2. Force Mount the WD Mac hard drive in Disk Utility
- 3. Run First Aid to fix WD My Passport for Mac not mounting error
- 4. Check the power supply of the WD My Passport for Mac drive
- 5. Check the USB cable
- 6. Check the USB port of your Mac
- 7. Check for driver update
What is meant by mounting a WD My Passport drive on Mac?
The WD My Passport for Mac hard drive is specially designed for Mac mini computers, iMacs, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air. You can access My passport for Mac drives only when macOS recognizes the format of the drive. This process is called mounting.
However, once your computer fails to recognize that format (also known as file system), the WD My Passport for Mac hard drive is not mounting on Mac computer.
Why is WD My Passport for Mac not mounting?
WD hard drives, including My Passport and Easystore, won't mount on Mac when the disk format is not recognized. Such error could be caused by virus infection, sudden power failure, sudden power outage, unwanted interruption during transferring data, etc. If the external hard drive won't mount, you can't open this WD My Passport for Mac drive and access your important files.
Here is one typical case from forums:
WD My Passport for Mac hard drive (2 TB) won't mount on my MacBook Air, grayed out in Disk Utility. I have 1 TB family photos on this hard drive, which are very precious for me. How to fix if WD My Passport for Mac not working on Mac? Any data recovery solution? Thanks a lot!
If you haven't got an effective workaround when WD My passport hard drive fails to mount in Finder or Disk Utility, this page will help. You'll know how to mount the Western Digital my passport drive on Mac again.
How to fix the unmounted WD My Passport hard drive on Mac?
The connected WD My Passport drive should be automatically mounted on the desktop, in Finder and Disk Utility. When it won't mount on Mac as you expect, you can try these methods.
1. Show the mounted WD My Passport for Mac hard drive on Mac destop
Sometimes, the My Passport drive is recognized and mounted by the Mac, and you just don't see it. You can go to Finder > Preferences and confirm if the 'External Disks' under 'Show these items on the desktop' is selected. This will ensure if the external drives connected to this Mac are allowed to show on the desktop.
But if your WD My Passport drive is not even showing up, it's reasonable that you can't see it mounting on Mac. Then, you shoud check the connections and some hardware issues.
2. Force Mount the WD Mac hard drive in Disk Utility
You can go to Utility and see if this hard drive appears in the left sidebar. If your WD My Passport for Mac drive for Mac is not mounting but grayed out in Disk Utility, you can right-click and select the 'Mount' button to force mount the hard drive. However, if this external hard drive is corrupted, the 'Mount' button will not be available and you need to try the next solution.
But sometimes, you can't mount a hard drive on Mac because of internal disk errors like file system corruption, partition table lost, the directory is corrupted, etc. You WD My Passport for Mac drive won't be recognized by your Mac in these cases. Fortunately, you can fix the hard drive not mounting issue with the native disk repair tool, First Aid.
3. Run First Aid to fix WD My Passport for Mac not mounting error
First Aid is a Mac built-in tool to verify and check minor problems of a hard disk. Whenever you can't mount a WD hard drive or My Passport for Mac is not working, First Aid should be a good disk repair tool.
- Step 1: Go to /Applications/Utilities/Disk Utility/, then click Continue.
- Step 2: In the sidebar, select the unmounted WD My Passport for Mac hard drive.
- Step 3: Click the 'First Aid' button.
- Step 4: Click Run.
If Disk Utility reports that the WD My Passport for Mac hard drive appears to be OK or has been repaired, you're done. Otherwise, this WD My Passport drive has been corrupted. You have to retrieve your data from this corrupted hard drive as soon as possible.
When those methods didn't make any difference and the WD My passport for Mac hard drive is not mounting still, you need to check some hardware issues that get involved in the disk connection.
Let's start with some basics factors.
4. Check the power supply of the WD My Passport for Mac drive
It's well known that insufficient or no power supply in USB ports could also lead to hard drive not mounting issue. Therefore, you should make sure the WD My Passport for Mac hard drive is getting the appropriate power. If the drive came with a Y-cable, use both USB connectors. Moreover, do not connect the drive through a USB hub, connect it directly to the Mac. Make sure the power adapter is connected directly to a wall outlet, not to an extension cord.
Wd My Passport Ultra Mac And Pc
5. Check the USB cable
Wd My Passport Ultra Mac Driver
When external hard drive is not showing up on Mac, ensure the cable is properly connected to both the drive and computer. Then try connecting your WD My Passport for Mac hard drive with a new USB cable if you can fetch another one.
6. Check the USB port of your Mac
If the problem still continues, try using a different USB port. Perhaps your Mac has two USB port - the back and front ones. Assuming the My passport driveis plugged in the front USB port, try to insert the drive to the back USB port.
7. Check for driver update
If the hardware seems to be OK, let's check the software that related to this disk problem. The My passport disk driver, a software component, bridges the operating system and the drive to communicate with each other. But the files of My passport driver could be deleted, outdated, or corrupted for virus invasion or misoperation.
So, when the WD My Passport drive is not working or the external hard drive won't mount on Mac, check the disk driver.
- Step 1: Click the Apple icon and select 'App Store…'
- Step 2: Click Update (NOT UPGRADE!) to install a specific update or Update All to install all available updates.
Sometimes, WD My Passport for Mac driver, software, and WD disk tool are needed, especially when you want to open a WD My Passport for Mac drive that is locked. You can go to WD official website and download software for WD My Passport troubleshooting and for WD My Passport driver update.
How to fix WD My Passport for Mac hard drive not mounting error without losing data?
Western Digital My Passport Ultra Mac
However, if WD My Passport for Mac hard drive still won't mount on Mac, the last solutions is to reformat the hard drive. But reformatting will delete all data stored on the hard drive, and most of the time, many important files are stored on the WD My Passport for Mac hard drive.
If you haven't backed up important files, how can you recover files from the WD My Passport drive? It's high time to recover lost data from the unmounted hard drive first.
Step 1: Recover lost data from unmountable hard drive with iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac
As for Mac data recovery, iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is highly recommended as it's a free Mac data recovery software. It can easily retrieve files from WD Passport drives. This software can recover lost data from corrupted hard drive, unreadable hard drives, formatted hard drives, unrecognized hard drives, unmountable hard drives, inaccessible hard drives, and recover lost data from uninitialized hard drive.
You can use this hard drive data recovery software on macOS Big Sur 11/Catalina 10.15/Mojave 10.14/High Sierra 10.13/10.12 Sierra and Mac OS X 10.11/10.10/10.9/10.8/10.7.
- 1. Free download and install iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
- 2. Launch iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac and select the unmounted WD My Passport for Mac hard drive.
- 3. Click 'Scan' to search for all lost files on this drive.
- 4. Preview the listed scanning results, choose files we want, and click 'Recover' button to get them back.
Hopefully, you'll get all your files off after the WD My Passport is not working nor mounting.
Step 2: Fix WD My Passport for Mac drive not mounting error by reformatting
After getting lost files back, you can fix WD My Passport for Mac hard drive not mounting error by reformatting without worrying about losing data. This will reset the WD My Passport hard drive.
• Guide to reformat WD My Passport for Mac external hard drive
Conclusion
WD My passport for Mac hard drives always offer quick and easy way to expand the storage space of your computer. It has amazing features like cloud storage, password protection with hard drive encryption, and compatiblity with Apple's Time Machine backup software, so that you can store a massive amount of photos, videos, music and documents.
But the WD My Passport for Mac drive not mounting issue will call a halt on all these good things. You need to repair the WD My Passport for Mac that is not working or corrupted first, and recover data with the assistance of iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
For any questions or suggestions, please email us below.
Get a data lifeguard for Mac
Most of the time, when you connect an external hard drive to your Mac’s USB port, you soon see it mount on the desktop. Apple likes to ensure these are easy to find, so they also appear in the Finder in the left-hand column under Locations.
However, sometimes, an external hard drive doesn't show up. It’s annoying, especially when you need to transfer something right then. And besides, there can be a risk that data on the external USB pen, hard, or flash drive is corrupt, which means you can’t transfer what you need between devices at all.
Corrupt data can be one reason your Mac won't recognize an external drive, but there are other reasons too. Let’s take a look at why this is happening and how you can fix the external hard drive not showing up problem:
Why your Mac does not recognize external hard drive
Let’s say you’ve encountered the problem of SSD not showing up. There could be a few reasons why SSD isn’t making an appearance (just as any other external drive), the most common being:
- There’s something wrong with the cable
- There’s a power supply problem
- Your drive has been corrupted or broken
- The drive is not readable on macOS
- NTFS read-only problem.
How to fix an external disk drive that won't show up on a Mac
While it’s impossible to instantly figure out why an external disk drive is not showing up, you have to try to fix the problem.
Access an External Drive Not Showing on Mac
Get a huge set of top utilities for troubleshooting external hard drives not mounting on a Mac
Start with the basics:
- Check whether the drive is properly plugged in. It sounds obvious, but since this relies on a wire - either a USB cable or HDMI cable - if it’s not connected properly then it won’t appear on your desktop.
- Faulty cable. Assuming it’s plugged in correctly, not wobbly or loose, the cable could be at fault. Try connecting the same device with a different cable.
- Damaged USB or flash drive port. It could be a hardware issue with the Mac. If you’ve got another port, try connecting the device to that one.
- Reboot your Mac. Sometimes, if a USB disk won't boot, the cause is a macOS issue. Hopefully, some data damage can be fixed by restarting. Choose the Apple menu > Restart. Or press and hold the power button and, when a dialog box appears, click Restart or press R. Restarting your Mac essentially clears your macOS’s memory and starts it up fresh.
- Incorrectly formatted drive. Not every external drive is optimized for Macs. It could be that you are trying to connect something only fit to interact with Windows devices. If you’ve got a PC or laptop, it’s worth connecting and seeing if you can access the files through another device. The best way to look for an incorrectly formatted drive is to go to
Apple (in the top toolbar menu) > About This Mac > Storage.
See if the external drive shows up here. For more information, go to the same menu option, then select System Report. - Mac not formatted to display external drives on the desktop. It could be that your Mac already recognizes the device, but just isn’t showing its icon on the desktop screen. Even if that is the case, the drive will still appear in the left-hand column of the Finder menu under Locations. You should be able to access your drive that way, and, in the Finder menu under Preferences > General, you can check External Drives to ensure that from now on it shows up on your desktop too.
- Reset NVRAM. To do this, shut down or restart your Mac, switch it back on and immediately press these four keys together for at least 20 seconds: Option, Command, P, and R. It should look as though your Mac has started again; if it has, release the keys when you hear the second startup chime. Hopefully, the hard drive has shown up now.
- Check Apple’s Disk Utility to see if an external drive is showing up. Disk Utility is within System Preferences, or you can find it using Spotlight. If it is visible, then click the option to Mount, which should make it visible on the desktop and in the External Drives option in the Finder menu.
Unfortunately, if none of those options has worked and you continue having the external hard drive not showing up problem, then it could have crashed, or be well and truly broken. But there might still be a way you can recover the data on the external drive.
How to fix new hard drive not showing up in Finder
When you connect a drive to Mac, it should appear in Finder under Locations. What to do if external hard drive is not detected? In most cases, when Finder doesn’t see your drive, you just have to change a few things in Preferences. However, sometimes, there are more serious problems such as insufficient power supply. Let’s see how you can fix these things.
How to show connected devices in Finder
Go to the Finder menu > Preferences
In General, click on External disks to ensure that from now on it shows on the desktop.
In the Sidebar tab, you can choose which folders and devices will be shown in the left-hand column of the Finder window.
How to add cloud storages to Finder
You can also mount cloud storage as a local drive on your Mac. By connecting Google Drive, Dropbox, or Amazon to your computer, you get more space for securely accessing and sharing files. For your ease, add cloud drives to Finder with CloudMounter so that you keep them close at hand. You can read detailed instructions on managing cloud storage as local drives here.
Repair the failed external drives with First Aid
The most direct reason your external hard drive could be detected by macOS but can't be opened is the file system problem. If your drive is having such problems, you can try to fix them yourself with First Aid and therefore get access to your files.
First Aid tool will check the disk for errors and then attempt a repair as needed. It helps to verify and repair a range of issues related to startup HD and external drive problems. If you are able to fix the hard drive or SSD in your Mac (or any external drive) using Disk Utility you will hopefully be able to recover your files.
To run Fist Aid on an external hard drive:
- Open Disk Utility. You can search for it using Spotlight or via Finder > Go > Utilities
- Check on your external hard drive, click the First Aid tab and select Run to start running diagnostics.
How to recover data from a crashed drive
If First Aid has been successful in fixing errors, the external drive should be available to mount. If the utility hasn’t repaired issues, your drive truly is broken or formatted using a file system that the Mac cannot read — in this way you have to recover data from a damaged disk drive.
Thankfully, there is an app for that. Disk Drill is the world’s premier data recovery software for Mac. Powerful enough to retrieve long-lost, mistakenly deleted files from Macs, external hard drives, USB drives, and camera cards.
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An easy way to recover lost files on an external hard drive
Here’s how to recover files with Disk Drill (pro version available on Setapp):
- Connect your drive to the Mac.
- Quit all other applications on the Mac, especially those that may be trying to access the external drive (e.g. iPhoto, Words)
- Launch Disk Drill.
- Click on the external drive that you are trying to recover files from. If it has partitions, you will see all of them. If, however, you still don’t see any volume to the external drive then you may need to try some of the steps above again or read the Disk Drill Scanning FAQs.
- To avoid the external drive being accessed during the recovery process, click Extras next to the drive or drive partition or file, then select Remount Volume As Read Only. A padlock will appear, protecting the drive during the process.
- Now click Rebuild (or Recover) next to the file(s) you are trying to recover. Once the scan is finished - it may take some time if the files are large - a list of files will appeal.
- Next, click Mount Found Items as Disk button on the bottom-left below the scan results.
- Disk Drill 'strongly suggests saving the files to a different drive than the one you are trying to recover files from. Saving to the same drive substantially lowers your chances of recovery.'
- A drive icon will appear, which once you double click will give you the option to open the files as you would do before they were lost. Drag them to another location, such as your desktop or a folder on your Mac.
- Open the files to ensure they have been recovered properly and safely eject the external drive.
Disk Drill does have other ways to recover lost files but assuming there are no complications, this method is the most effective.
A few more tips on getting your files back
- Macs and third-party apps that look after Macs, such as Disk Drill and iStat Menus come with a S.M.A.R.T. (also known as Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology) status monitor. If a SMART check reports errors, then it could mean the hard drive is at risk of failing completely. Within Disk Utility and Disk Drill, there are several solutions for this: Repair Disk Permissions and Repair Disk. If neither of them works, it’s recommended to back up all of the data from the disk, erase it, then run a SMART check again. The external hard drive should show up as Verified.
- Partitions can get lost within hard drives, temporarily hiding all of the information contained within. Disk Drill can help to identify and restore this information.
- Within Disk Drill, you can restore data when a hard drive is damaged or add formatting, which is also something Disk Utility can help with.
- CleanMyMac, another useful app available from Setapp, can help you identify external hard drive errors and repair them. It is an essential tool worth trying when you’re having external hard drive difficulties.
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Alternative ways to recover data from an external hard drive
Reset the System Management Controller (SMC) if your Mac shuts down when you plug in an external hard drive. Then use a different port to connect the external hard drive. If you’ve got a battery that you can’t remove:
- Shut down and unplug the power adapter
- Press and hold Shift-Control-Option and the power button for 10 seconds
- Release all keys
- Plug the power adapter back in and switch your Mac back on.
For Macs with removable batteries, you need to switch them off, remove the battery, then press and hold the power button for 5 seconds. After that, put the battery back in, plug in the power adapter and switch the power on again.
How to fix external drive NTFS read-only problem
External hard disk detected but not opening? One reason your Mac isn’t recognizing the hard drive is the file format. Windows uses NTFS file formats, while Macs, up until the introduction of Sierra, have used HFS+. Now, Apple has introduced the Apple File System (APFS) for newer operating systems.
If you connect an NTFS drive, your Mac will be able to read it but not edit it. This means you can’t really complete your task (move, copy, or delete any files) as long as you experience the read-only problem. There’s an easy way to fix this with iBoysoft NTFS, an app that enables full read/write support for NTFS drives on Mac.
How to make Ext2/Ext3 drives readable on Mac
The common issue is Ext2- and Ext3-formatted drives are not readable on macOS. There are two ways to access such external drives on your Mac — via Linux OS or FUSE system. The easiest would be installing Linux to a secondary drive or virtual machine.
If you go with Linux installation, dual boot your Mac with Linux on another drive and use FAT32 as a transfer intermediary. If you don’t have the drive to install Linux to, use a virtual machine as an interface for it. Transferring can be done the same way – with FAT32, or via network.
My Passport For Mac Not Showing Up On Windows
Another option for reading Ext2/Ext3 disks is mounting disk with Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE). Basically, it works as an extra interface enabling file system access via specially installed modules. Here’s how to mount drives with FUSE:
My Passport For Mac Is Not Showing Up On My Desktop
- Install FUSE for macOS or MacFUSE as well as a fuse-ext2 module.
- Use the following Terminal command to enable Disk Utility’s debug menu and see all partitions: defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUDebugMenuEnabled 1
- Attach your Ext2/Ext3 drive and locate the device name via Disk Utility.
- In your user account, create a folder to be used as a mount point.
- Use the following Terminal command to mount the drive as read-only: fuse-ext2 /dev/disk2s2 /Volumes/mountpoint
- For write support, use the command: fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk2s2 /Volumes/mountpoint
And that’s not the only case where Terminal helps you access external drive. Employ the handy all-powerful Terminal, which always comes forward with solutions for difficult problems. Especially if System Information does recognize the USB or hard drive, but continues to hide it from you, disconnect the drive and try to find it using the Terminal, which you can find in Applications > Utilities.
- Once in the Terminal, type in the command diskutil list
- A list with information about volumes and drives should appear
- Look for a section labelled /dev/disk_ (external, physical)
- Make a note of the whole line after the word disk
- Now put the following command into the Terminal diskutil info disk followed by the number or digits assigned to that disk
- Now you should see detailed information about the drive, therefore confirming that your Mac can and does recognize it
- Eject using the Terminal by entering the command diskutil eject disk followed by the number or digits assigned to that disk
- Physically remove the disk from your Mac
- Plug it back in and your Mac should recognize it.
Console is also reliable when it comes to solving tricky problems, although it isn’t always that easy to use. You can find Console under Applications > Utilities > Console or via Spotlight. Console shows if an external drive or any error is detected under the Errors and Faults tab. If no errors show up, then the problem is not caused by the device.
How to fix insufficient power supply
My Passport For Mac Help
Another thing that might cause USB drive not showing up is that your USB cable is just not powerful enough. Typically, a USB 1.0 or 2.0 works, but there are drives that require more power. In this case, you should get another connector or use some type of USB hub to increase the power supply. If you still can’t access external hard drive, consider switching to another Mac.
Conclusion
Hopefully, we’ve covered the topic so you don’t have to google “external hard drive disappear from the computer” ever again. There are lots of potential solutions for a Mac not reading/writing an external hard drive. If you’re trying to connect an NTFS drive, do it with iBoysoft NTFS for Mac. If you need to add cloud storage, CloudMounter will help you. Most importantly, you’ll never have to worry about a crashed or corrupted external drive because Disk Drill will help you recover all the data stored on it.
iBoysoft NTFS, CloudMounter, Disk Drill, and other powerful apps such as CleanMyMac X are all available via Setapp, a productivity suite that solves your tasks with apps. Give it a try for seven days free and fix all your Mac issues in one go.