External hard drive not showing in My Computer

[proquals]

HELP!!!

I have a 500gb external hard drive which, up until a few days ago, was working absolutely fine.

When I would plug it in to my laptop the device was found under 'my computer'.but would not open. Instead when I tried to open it my computer froze and the 'not responding' message was shown, resulting in a forced close of my computer. Now when I attach the hard drive and open 'my computer' the hard drive does not show at all, but 'my computer' still shows the message 'not responding', resulting in a forced close.

I've been on to a couple of forums already and tried the route of right clicking 'my computer', 'manage' and 'disk management'; but the hard drive does not appear there.

I'm at a total loss what to do and would massively appreciate your help as I have backed up company data on to this hard drive.

Thank you in advance!

 

[TheHawk]

Hey pcrquals. I would try the drive in another pc to narrow down where the problem is, a problem with the drive itself, or a problem with the pc recognizing the drive, which might be a problem with the USB port(s) or with the USB drivers. Does another USB device like a flashdrive work when plugged into the same port?

 

[raybay]

Is this a drive you formatted and set up? Or is this a store bought item in a case with a brand name?
The store-bought drives in enclosures have a very bad history... among the worst failure rates in computer-dom... Unless you have a lot of valuable data on it awreddy, test it on another machine... then if non-working stop while you are ahead, and build your own from a good Western Digital or Sealate with an enclosure from someplace like Directron.com or NewEgg or Frys, or CDW.com.

 

[Barradice]

Hey pcrquals. I would try the drive in another pc to narrow down where the problem is, a problem with the drive itself, or a problem with the pc recognizing the drive, which might be a problem with the USB port(s) or with the USB drivers. Does another USB device like a flashdrive work when plugged into the same port?

@The Hawk : I have a similar prob with my ext Iomega 1GB HD. Have been using it for a long time on my laptop but suddenly is not recognized on my computer. I try to follow previous fixes such as I go to Disk Management, find my device there and says it is unallocated. When I right click only gives me the option of New Simple Volume. There is a smaller box to the left and when I right click on that gives me the options of Convert to dynamic disk or GPT disk. Where to go from here?? Any Help is greatly appreciated

 

[Larrt cline]

You should read more on this, If it's a USB vs. Parallel Port

 

[DelJo63]

... I go to Disk Management, find my device there and says it is unallocated. When I right click only gives me the option of New Simple Volume. There is a smaller box to the left and when I right click on that gives me the options of Convert to dynamic disk or GPT disk. Where to go from here?? Any Help is greatly appreciated

STOP - HALT - DON'T do this!!
The Status unallocated means you lost the partition table - - if you're not careful, you will loose everything.

 

[holdum323]

Hi. It has been my experience that if a external Hard drive is not removed safely, the data can be corrupted and the drive can also be damaged. The USB port can also be damaged as was explained by another member. This may not be the case these days, but I have always been told to remove the HD safely, and that's what I always do.
Also, just because the drive was good yesterday, doesn't mean it's OK today. If the drive is shutting down your PC when accessed, that is a bad sign. Someone suggested testing on another machine. I agree with that suggestion.
There are two different problems being asked. The above reply is for the OP.
For the second members issue, here's article about basic and dynamic disks. If disk management shows the drive to be unallocated, I'm guessing your data is history.
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa363785(v=vs.85).aspx

 

[priya456]

Hi there, My drive used to show up on my computer but after a few months It stopped showing up on my computer and was showing up fine on my laptop.

I found a solution for my Hard Disk HP External Drive which was not showing up on Windows 7 64 Bit. All I did was went to control Panel and then Devices and Printers and I could see that my drive was showing there, but not coming up as a drive on my computer. So I went to the properties and > driver and uninstalled the driver and then went to Device Manager and select scan for Hard Ware Changes, and thats it, next time when Win 7 automatically installed the External HDD Drivers my drive started showing up again.

 

[DelJo63]

So I went to the properties and > driver and uninstalled the driver and then went to Device Manager and select scan for Hard Ware Changes, and thats it, next time when Win 7 automatically installed the External HDD Drivers my drive started showing up again.

Good Choice (y)