Windows 10: win 10 PC will not find my USB powered external HDD.

Good catch. I meant 4TB. Edited and fixed. Thanks

 

You're welcome! I think for the most part people are too simply too used to seeing GB=Gigabyte and only now are starting more or less to get into the larger capacity 1.5-5tb drives. A few companies have the 5tb models out but watch the prices!

 

Hi Topgundpc, my new USB 3.0/2.0 sata/ide converter cable arrived. I installed it and opened up Disk Management and for a brief moment it showed up as :J drive. It then posted a msg saying that there was something wrong with the HDD , did I want to fix it and move on ? It then disconnected from disk management, never to be seen again. Am I missing something here? What do I have to do to get the drive letter back up on disk management? Any thoughts here please?
Regards KnockaT.

 

Sorry Topgundpc, I omitted to add the error msg.

 

With the device plugged in. Open the Device Manager (Win+X->Device Manager) and look under Universal Serial Bus controllers
Do you see any yellow exclamation mark ?

 

Another place to check is in the System notification area where you right click on the Safely Remove hardware icon to see if the usb controller is listed. You may have to click the usb device if listed there to eject that and unplug the usb cord for a moment. When replugging it back in the fresh detection may see it fully detected. Hopefully that is what the problem is and not anyi issue with cable or drive.

Devices plugged in by usb can disappear if Windows suddenly loses track of them like a plug not all the way in or loose. I don't like the sudden disappearing act in the DM however since that could indicate some type of fault with the cable itself or you have a drive going on you? But try getting Windows to detect if fresh. You might have to try that a few times.

 

Hi Topgundpc and Night hawk, well its a case of one step forward and two backwards fortunately

After a lot of time and effort I think I have finally found the problem(s). I had 3 other HDD's here which I tried to connect with the new 3.0/2.0 SATA cable and found the cable was faulty. Having fixed that I tried again and all 3 drives were picked up by win10. This raised my hopes somewhat and I tried to connect the win7 drive that holds the data I wanted to recover. To my dismay. I got an error msg saying there is a serious problem with this disk drive. I can only surmise that it must have been the HD that caused the initial meltdown. So I am resigned to think that that is my lot.!! It was a worthwhile exercise which taught me a lot and I would like to thank you both for your help and time afforded to me. Thanks guys, I am very grateful.
Best regards KnockaT.

 

Sorry to hear the bad news you are facing there! *cry

I had to suspect something was definitely wrong when seeing your last post. When running any version of Windows however it's always best to see the drive installed internally and not try to run it by way of usb while eSata would make for a much better alternative still connected to the onboard sata port by an extension cable going to the external plug in.

 

You will need that proper cable with power but be aware Win 10 will not always see drives 1 Tb or larger except the drive they boot from. None of my working drives 1 Tb or larger that are usb are useable on the Win 10 machines.

 

I find that rather interesting as the two matched storage/backup drives just added in recently to replace a pair of 5yr. old 1tb drives are WD RE class "Heavy Duty" 2tb drives working flawlessly!

The pair of 1tb drives that were replaced first went into an external usb enclosure for backing everything up from those before one became the second OS drive on another machine and the second first assumed to be worn and having access problems on 7 before 10 is now in a newer fan cooled enclosure presently plugged in by usb until I get a chance to hook up the eSata cables for the case and plug the two ports into the board.

On the second case being a mini tower I simply slapped together back in 2013 for 7 Pro only seeing the single 500gb OS drive and still used mainly for testing with remote access the WD Green(energy efficient model) 1tb sits in the first usb enclosure there. Not one problem with any of those being seen on 10 here.