Macs are pretty solid computers that provide reliable service in almost any situation; they’re renown for soldier onwards in situations that would get a blue screen of death on a Windows PC. However, while rare, issues can and will happen; it’s inevitable, where technology is concerned. These issues are all the more frustrating because of their rarity, and they may need a little work to figure out. One issue I came across last week was an external hard drive not showing up on a Mac, even when all evidence said that it should have. Here’s how to fix it. Also see our article External drives are a cheap way to expand storage without having to replace the internal hard drive.
Just connect it via USB or Thunderbolt and it appears in Finder. From there you can do pretty much whatever you like with it. If it doesn’t show up in Finder,though, it will surely show up in the Disk Utility within Utilities. This is a sub-folder within the Applications folder, with a crossed screwdriver and wrench on the folder icon, while Disk Utility looks like a hard drive being examined with a stethoscope.
How easy is it to reformat? It is for Time Machine. Connect it, power it up, go to Disk Utility (in Applications/Utilities), select the WD disk on the left, go to the Erase tab, and choose 'Mac OS Extended'. Click the 'File System' drop-down menu and select 'NTFS' if you plan to use the drive only in Windows operating systems. If you also need to use the drive on a Mac, select 'exFAT.' Optionally, enter a name for the drive in the Volume Label field. This name helps identify the drive in File Explorer.
Both of them will be referenced a lot. From there you can troubleshoot the problem and usually fix it. If that doesn’t work, we have a couple of simple troubleshooting tips to fix an external hard drive not showing up on Mac.
First we will check the basics, and from there we make sure that MacOS is set up to display external drives, can mount the drive, and that the drive has no errors on either the disk itself or its file structure. First Things First As William Ockham once said, the simplest solution tends to be the best one. Considering that, let us check all the basics first. Get into the habit of doing this with any computer issues, as it can save time, money, and hassle in the long run.
After all, no one wants to waste half a day because they didn’t realize something just wasn’t plugged in properly. Check that the cable from the hard drive to your Mac is connected properly. Check that the external hard drive has power if it needs it. Check the condition of the cable and swap it if you have a spare.
![My passport for mac My passport for mac](http://cdn.osxdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/format-usb-mac.jpg)
Change the hard drive power cable if you have a spare. Try a different wall outlet if there is one nearby. Reboot your Mac to see if it was an open program or app stopping the drive being detected. Make sure the drive has been formatted. Some imported drives come completely empty, and while MacOS should detect and offer to format them, it doesn’t always work.
Try attaching the external drive to another computer to see if it works on that one to rule out damage to the drive itself. Make sure your drive doesn’t have or use a power saving or sleep function.
Turn it off if it does. Check that the drive is receiving enough power. A USB cable carries 5V and if this is the sole power source for the drive, it may not be enough. Use a USB power cable if you suspect this to be the issue. Depending on what you find here, you can troubleshoot either the drive or your Mac. First, make sure Finder will display drive icons. By default, it doesn’t display much and the setting to not show external disks may be enabled.
Open a Finder window. Select Preferences and the General tab. Make sure the box next to External disks is checked. If the box is checked, move on to fix external hard drive not showing up on Mac. Mount the Drive in Finder If you think the drive works fine, let us see if we can manually attach it to MacOS.
For that we need to mount it. This should be done automatically when MacOS detects the drive, but it doesn’t always work.
Attach the drive if it isn’t already connected. Open Utilities and Disk Utility. Make sure the disk is listed in the left window. It should be labeled External Disk.
Check for a volume if the disk is present. If a volume is present but not mounted, it should be grayed out here. Highlight the volume and select Mount. The volume should shift from gray to normal to signify it has been mounted. Open Finder and navigate to the drive in Devices.
If this doesn’t work, you may need to use the Verify Disk utility to make sure everything is working as it should. Open Utilities and Disk Utility. Highlight the grayed out volume.
Select First Aid in the top center. Select Run to perform disk diagnostics and fix any issues. Running First Aid on an external disk is a useful way to make sure the format or file structure doesn’t contain any faults or issues. If there are any, First Aid will fix them and MacOS should then mount the disk without any further hassle. Got any other ways to fix external hard drive not showing up on Mac? Tell us about it below if you do!
Hard Drive Format for Mac and PC Both Mac OS X and Windows allow users to format their hard drives using built-in utilities. Even though most people associate formatting with system installation, there are many other reasons why you might want to format your hard drive.
When you purchase a brand-new hard drive, there’s no guarantee that it will be pre-formatted from the factory, nor is there any guarantee that it will come with the right file system. Optimization is another good reason for hard drive formatting. Data fragmentation remains an issue even in the era of mobile devices, and in some cases formatting is the fastest way how to solve it.
Of course, you may also just want to quickly delete the content of an entire hard drive. Regardless of why you want to format your hard drive, there are some considerations to be made before you begin. First and foremost, you need to decide which file system to use.
Mac OS X uses the HFS Plus file system, while Windows uses the NTFS file system. Both Mac OS X and Windows also support the FAT32 file system, but we don’t recommend it for hard drives. Because FAT32 supports only up to 4 GB large files, it should be used only with flash drives. If you need to format external hard drive Mac or Windows, you may also consider the exFAT files system. Developed by Microsoft, this modern file system is optimized for situations where the NTFS file system is not a feasible solution, and the file size limit of the standard FAT32 file system is unacceptable. How to Format a Hard Drive for Mac Mac OS X users have at their disposal a handy tool called Disk Utility.
With it, it’s possible to easily format and storage device with just a few clicks. You can launch it from the App list or use Spotlight. The main window of the utility contains a list of storage devices, storage device details, and formatting options. Select your storage device, choose your desire file system, specify the name, and click on the Erase button. Click on the Erase button again to confirm your decision and wait for the process to end. How to Format a Hard Drive for Windows To format a hard drive for Windows, open the File Explorer and click on This PC. If the hard drive you want to format is connected to your PC, it should be there.
Right-click on it and select the Format option from the context menu. Keep in mind that you can only format storage devices that are currently not in use.
Windows will present you with a formatting window where you can specify various formatting parameters. After you confirm your selection, it should take just a few moments for the formatting process to finish.
![How To Format A Windows Passport External Hard Drive For Mac How To Format A Windows Passport External Hard Drive For Mac](/uploads/1/2/5/4/125407925/273911978.jpg)
Recover Data from a Formatted Hard Drive Realizing that you’ve forgot to back up a critically important file from a newly formatted hard drive feels horrible. Without a capable data recovery tool, there’s nothing you can do about it. That’s why countless people from around the world have turned to Disk Drill, selecting it as their data recovery tool of choice.