usually when you plug in an external hard drive to your Mac ’s USB port you will see it seem on the desktop . you could also see it in a Finder windowpane in the left column under Locations ( or Devices in old versions of macOS ) . If the crusade is not demonstrate up on your Mac probability are it has not been formatted aright , has been buy , or is faulty . instead , you may have set a password for the drive that you require to enter before it will connect .
We show you how to play out whether the reason the international drive is not mounting on your Mac up is due to a trouble with the campaign itself , the cable or the larboard , and how to fix the trouble and access information on your drive .
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This article take on you have an external crusade that should connect to your Mac via the USB - A , USB - C , or a Thunderbolt interface . If you have a NAS drive that connects over the internet then you should read our article aboutconnecting to a NAS drive .
Why is your hard drive not showing up on Mac?
We ’ll start by try out to identify the reason why your hard driveway is n’t showing up on the Mac before explaining what you need to do to see the tough driving force on your Mac . If you’re able to identify the cause your should be able-bodied to pay off the trouble that is stopping your outside thrust from orifice on your Mac .
Damaged cable, port or insufficient power
The first port of call is always to check into that it ’s plugged in , but we are sure you have done that . The problem might be with the cable .
One of the main reasons why drives fail to mount is if the driveway is n’t receive enough force . If the crusade is power via a USB - A cablegram you need to check that adequate powerfulness is being deport to the drive . Very quondam Macs may ask a USB power cable television , a cable that part into two USB connecter that demand to both be plugged into your Mac , to save enough power to the drive . likewise , make certain that the drive does n’t have an external ability supplying it should be using .
On the subject area of line , make trusted that it ’s not at fault . Try using a unlike cable television service with the driving force to see if that pay off the problem . likewise , if you are using a USB port on a hub hindrance that ’s not what ’s causing the problem .
Also curb that the port on your Mac is n’t the problem . hear using a different port . Or if you only have one larboard , plug another machine in and see if that works .
The next whole tone is to try plugging the drive into another Mac . If it also fails to mount there you will know that there is a trouble with the drive while if it does climb on then the problem is with your Mac .
Problem preferences
Hopefully , there is a really easy fix to get the hard drive to climb on your desktop . Try the following to make certain your Mac is set to show mounted drives on the desktop .
If it was already set up so that the outside drive would appear on the desktop then continue to come the steps below .
Password protections
you could protect a drive with a password when you initially set about using it , so check to see if the reason your drive is n’t mounting is that a password request box has popped up and you did n’t notice it .
Sometimes the password popup take a few minute to seem as well , so it helps to be patient .
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The drive is formatted for a PC
It is possible that the drive has been initialise using a file organisation that your Mac can not say .
An easy way to find out if this is the problem would be to check on a PC . If the drive mount on the personal computer it ’s likely that you have discovered what the problem is : the cause is formatted for microcomputer and ca n’t be read by your Mac .
To make certain your drive can be read by Macs and PCs you postulate to format it using exFAT or the older FAT32 . We ’ll explain how to do that below .
It’s a corrupted or faulty drive
If none of the above were the reason why you could n’t see the external movement on your Mac , perhaps the drive is faulty . If it is , you could use Apple ’s Disk Utility program to get at the disk and potentially sterilise whatever is causing the issue . We ’ll discuss how to do that below . We ’ll also look at ways you could halt a crusade failing in the future .
How fix an external drive that won’t show up on a Mac
If none of the above solved your problem , it is probable the crusade is either formatted falsely or damaged .
count on the reason why you ca n’t see the drive , here is what you necessitate to do to get it working .
How to reformat a drive so you can see it on a Mac
Hopefully , the crusade is fine , but the format is wrong .
It is possible that the difficult drive has been formatted using a dissimilar file organization ( i.e. on a Windows PC ) . In that case , if you ask to reach the information on the drive you ’ll need to plug in the parkway to a Windows PC that does recognize it and imitate the information before moving on to the next step because the cognitive process will involve reformatting the drive and delete everything on i ) .
Having get the data of the driving via a personal computer you could reformat the ride so that you could add the data point again . Here ’s how to reformat your drive so it can be read by a Mac or a PC .
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record more : How to initialize a crusade on a Mac .
How to fix the faulty drive with Disk Utility
If the various tick above suggest that the magnetic disc is faulty then you could use Apple’sDisk Utilityprogram to reach the platter and potentially desexualize whatever is do the issue . Here ’s what to do :
Best apps to recover data on a lost drive
If your Mac is ineffectual to repair the phonograph record if is likely that the drive is either formatted using a file system that the Mac can not record , or it is well and truly broken . If it ’s the latter we suggest you pursue this tutorial aboutrecovering data from a damaged disk . You may also require to take one of the data recovery apps for Mac we recommend in our round - up of theBest information recovery apps for Macs .
Our passport includeRecoveritfrom Wondershare , Data Rescuefrom Prosoft andStella Data Recovery for Mac .
1. Wondershare Recoverit
2. Data Rescue
3. Stellar Data Recovery for Mac
How to prevent issues with hard drives on a Mac
We have last suggestion to make that is more of a guard duty against this error happening again .
verify that your external drive does n’t become damage in the future by always unmounting the magnetic disk properly after using it . Do n’t just unplug the USB cable .
To unmount your driveway you could right - come home ( control - click ) on the picture on the Desktop or in the Finder and chooseEject . Drive issues can occur when the record is removed without ejecting it properly .
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Decided there is no Bob Hope for your wrong hard drive ? We have a rhythm - up of some of the best we ’ve seen here : The best Mac hard drives .
