Windows 10: External hdd recognized in comp mgmt but wants to format

My external hdd can be opened in pc, but in laptop it wants to Format.
It asks to give it another drive letter, which I do, but still says " do you want to format?"
How can I get this drive to open?
I also tried Disc Clean. Same message.
Thanks,
Paul

:)

 

External HDD 1.0 TB

I have a Toshiba External 1 TB HDD. It only recognizes 7 GB available memory. Many attempts to format

are not successful. What is the correct procedure to properly format for the full capacity of the drive??

 

internal to external HDD not recognized

I threw away a old Toshiba satellite and want to convert the HDD to external (it has Linux mint on it) I want to format it as a win 10 storage drive but it doesn't recognize when I go to management all the menus are grey. I can't rename it either. I'm
currently on a Lenovo laptop g51.

 

Its showing as raw which means its lost the parition table you need to download free parition recovery software to get it back

 

It was able to read it yesterday when I downloaded a backup to it.
Also opens on my PC, so how can it be Raw?

 

Its reporting it as raw in your screen shot try it back on another pc

 

Hi PSCO2007W10

Your external disk has a drive letter. So it is not a partition loss problem.

Run check disk from command prompt.

Open Command prompt. Start > All programs > Accessories > Command Prompt

Type
CHKDSK D: /f /v /r /x Press enter. Note: Replace D: with the actual drive letter of the external drive. Please note there is a space between every switch/option.

Allow check disk to complete. ( Do not abort checkdisk for any reason midway. That would leave your disk in a much worse condition. If it aborts by itself its OK. In that case we shall do a thorough check with TestDisk)

 

Thanks,
I'll do it tomorrow and let you know if it is successful.

 

Tried your suggestion.
Got this message in screenshot.

 

Hi Jumanji,
I'm running Testdisk now.
Should take about an hour.
I'll let you know results.
I got an original message that said it was Fat32 which is really strange, since this hdd came with this laptop (I pulled it out and used as an external after inserting an SSD)
It was NTFS at that time.
Paul

 

It just finished and said "structure ok) but also said "partition can't be recovered" but then started a new test.
I don't know why, but you said not to abort so I'm letting it run.
It looks like I may have to Format, unless you have any other ideas.
Thanks, so far.
Paul

 

As post 2 useparition recovery software Recovery of accidentally deleted partition with Active@ Partition Recovery - YouTube

 

Thanks, I'll dl it.
Should I stop the 2nd scan or will that do further damage?
Paul

 

I said do not abort checkdisk midway. I also said if it aborts by itself it is OK and in that case we shall try TestDisk. Instead of waiting for my instructions on how to use TestDisk, you went ahead and started TestDisk. You can close TestDisk anytime by clicking on the X mark in the top right of title bar. It is OK as long as you hadn't given a write command.

Don't jump the instructions. Don't jump to conclusions.

If you want to use TestDisk in this case, you should not analyse. Checkdisk outlines what exactly could be wrong. The volume boot record at sector 2048 is corrupt. With that in mind we shall check your drive and try to recover the data and/or restore the drive.

Follow the TestDisk process outlined in my post #6 in this thread Seagate 2 TB External HD file info corrupted

Go upto screen 5, and post a screenshot of that screen. Further instructions will follow after I check on it.

NOTE:

If you get a different screen at anytime, post a screenshot and then close TestDisk.

You can close TestDisk Window anytime by clicking on X in top right of the Title Bar.

You can run TestDisk any number of times as per the above instructions. Your data will not be affected since we are not writing anything to the disk.

Please be informed that active@partition recovery is not freeware. I have no objections if you want to buy a license. *Smile