Windows 10: Windows 11 Photos App using external hard drive storage

I just got a brand new laptop with windows 11 and Photos App standard. It’s been completely updated. I plugged in my 2TB external harddrive, it ran a fix on the hard drive and says it’s all good to go now with no issues. I opened Photos App and loaded my 2TB lifetime of photos and videos . Was over 220,000 files and took all night just to load up. But Photos App won’t let me do anything with these photos without uploading them first. So I can’t check for duplicates which I know there are many from overlapping backups in the past or create memories.I assumed when it was loading the files to t

:)

 

unrecognised external hard drive on Windows 10

Since you already reinstalled the drivers of the External Hard Drive, let's run the
Hardware and Devices troubleshooter as it can resolve your concern. You can do that by following these steps:

• 
  Press the Start button.
  
• 
  Type and select Troubleshooting.
  
• 
  Click on View all on the left panel.
  
• 
  Select and run the Hardware and Devices troubleshooter.
  

If the Hardware and Devices troubleshooter doesn’t resolve your concern, we suggest that you change the letter of the External Hard Drive. You can do that by following these steps:

• 
  Press the Start button.
  
• 
  Type and select Control panel.
  
• 
  Select System and Security.
  
• 
  Select Administrative Tools, and a new window will appear.
  
• 
  Double-click Computer Management, and a new window will appear.
  
• 
  Select Disk Management that is located under
  Storage in the left pane.
  
• 
  Right click on the External Hard Drive that is not showing on the File Explorer.
  
• 
  Select Change letter and network path, and a new window will appear.
  
• 
  Select Change, and choose the letter that you want for the External Hard Drive.
  

After changing the letter of the External Hard Drive, we suggest that you reboot your laptop for the changes to take effect.



Let us know how it goes.



Regards.

 

External Hard Drive

To address your concern, here are the troubleshooting steps that you can try. Follow the steps below:

Uninstall and reinstall the external hard drive program.

• In the Settings app, go to System.
• Go to Apps & features and locate the external hard drive program.
• Uninstall the program and go to the manufacturer's website to reinstall the updated version.

Uninstall and reinstall the Paragon driver software.

• Following the same steps mentioned above, locate the software in Apps & features
  and uninstall it.
• After uninstalling the software, go to the manufacturer's website to reinstall it.
  

To further isolate your concern, we'd also like to verify if the OneDrive app is enabled on your PC.

You can hit us back for additional help.

Kind regards.

 

Photos and external hard drive problem

Hello,

I have an external hard drive full of photos. I am hoping to link these photos to the Windows 10 Photos app without moving them to the laptop's internal hard drive. I want them to stay on the external drive and, furthermore, want any new photos added (from
my phone, for example) to go to this external hard drive as well.

I have already changed the pathways of where Pictures will be saved to this hard drive.

Anyway, plugged in the external hard drive full of photos and overnight the Photos app pulled found them, organized them by date, etc. All seemed well. Later that day, however, I closed Photos and then removed the hard drive. Later reconnected the hard
drive and started Photos but there was nothing on Photos! The program apparently needs to re-find the photos and rebuild the library every time I plug in the hard drive...this takes hours. Am I missing a process that would allow the Photos app to remember
the library whenever I plug in the hard drive?

Thanks!