Windows 10: Why does Windows 11 keep losing my USB hard drive connection

My Windows 11 desktop keeps dropping access to my external USB hard drive. This is my backup drive and when not available the back up does not work. How can I fix this so the drive is accessible at all times.

:)

 

Hard Drive not Showing

Hi Lori,

Thank you for posting back.

• How are you connecting the Hard drive to your computer?
• Have you tried connecting the hard drive to a different computer and check if it works?

It's possible that your USB drivers are corrupt. I suggest you to try the following steps and check.

• Press Windows Key +R and type
  devmgmt.msc to open Device manager.
• Expand Universal Serial Bus controllers
  at the left bottom.
• Right-click the first USB controller under Universal Serial Bus controllers, and then click on
  Uninstall to remove it.
• Repeat these steps for the entire USB controller under Universal Serial Bus controllers.
• Restart the computer. After the computer starts, Windows will automatically scan for hardware changes and reinstall all the USB controllers that you uninstalled.

Keep us posted with the status of the issue to assist you further.

Thank you.

 

Unable to connect USB Hard Drives to laptop

After having connected a
Sisun HDD docking station to my Sony Laptop , Windows Explorer refuses to recognise any USB hard drive (although other software such as a disk utility can) and I am therefore unable to save files to these drives. Windows does recognise some USB pen drives
but larger HDD are not recognised. To date, I have;

• Uninstalled the USB controllers through Device manager (forcing Windows to reinstall them on reboot); and
• Run both the WinUSB and DeviceDiagnostic software to no avail.

I'd rather not do a clean reinstall of Windows as I am unable to backup my files. Any other suggestions?

 

Toshiba Ext Hard Drive

Hi Tony,

I realize that you are facing the issue connecting the external hard drive in Windows 10, let me assist you.

To assist you better, let us know the following details.

• Which build of Windows 10 is installed in your system?
• What is the make and model of your system?
• Do other USB devices are getting connected to the system?

As an initial step if troubleshooting, I suggest you to try connecting the external hard drive through different USB ports and check if it is getting detected, also try connecting the same external hard drive to a different Windows 10 system.

Also, connect the external hard drive to the system and check whether the device is shown in Device Manager.

• Type Device Manager in the Search bar and press
  Enter key.
• Click on View option and click on Show hidden devices.
• Check whether the device is shown.

Hope the information helps. Kindly write back to us with the updated status of the issue for further assistance on Windows. We will be glad to assist you.