external hard drive formatted now invisible on laptop

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  1. Posts : 14
    windows 10
       #1

    external hard drive formatted now invisible on laptop


    Hi, I fitted the hard drive from my old PC into an external enclosure. I plugged it into my Win 10 Laptop and backed up some files I wanted to keep, so far so good. I now want to use the drive as a backup for the Laptop so I formatted the drive using Macrorit disk partition expert. The drive is still running as before but now its completely invisible on the Laptop and the Macrorit software,

    Is it possible to fix this and make the drive visible again?, thanks for any advice guys.
    regards, ron
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 30,075
    Windows 11 Pro x64 Version 23H2
       #2

    Hi ronfrew.

    If you right click Start, click Disk Management is the drive there?

    Ken
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 14
    windows 10
    Thread Starter
       #3

    Hi Ken,

    Just checked the Disk Management and the drive is not shown.

    regards,ron
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 30,075
    Windows 11 Pro x64 Version 23H2
       #4

    Have you tried reseating cables.

    Can you see disk or volume with diskpart?
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 30,075
    Windows 11 Pro x64 Version 23H2
       #5

    as well do you have another machine you can connect to?
      My Computer


  6. Posts : 14
    windows 10
    Thread Starter
       #6

    HI Ken,

    I discovered Diskpart was not on my Laptop so I installed and ran it, and it does in fact find and identify the External Drive as DISK 1.
    Next I ran the Disk Management program again and is now showing the Drive as DISK 1 BASIC ONLINE 232.88 GB UNALLOCATED. Is the Drive now ready to be used Ken or do I need install partitions or something first.

    regards, ron
      My Computer


  7. Posts : 30,075
    Windows 11 Pro x64 Version 23H2
       #7

    If you right click in the area where it says Unallocated it should give you the option to create a simple volume. You can make it one big partition or ......

    If you don't get the option to create simple volume then in left column where it says Disk 1 right click and initialize.

    Then create one simple volume or .....
    Last edited by Caledon Ken; 25 Oct 2017 at 07:57.
      My Computer


  8. Posts : 18,421
    Windows 11 Pro
       #8

    ronfrew said:
    HI Ken,

    I discovered Diskpart was not on my Laptop so I installed and ran it
    If diskpart was not on your laptop, you've got some big problems. And it would be interesting to know where you installed it from. Diskpart is one of the very base commands included with Windows.
      My Computer


  9. Posts : 41,366
    windows 10 professional version 1607 build 14393.969 64 bit
       #9

    Was anything in a RAID configuration?
    Does the bios recognize the drive?

    There are 4 places to check the drive:
    1) BIOS
    2) Disk management
    3) Device manager
    4) File explorer

    What do you see with each of the above?

    And what do you see when the drive is returned to the original PC?
      My Computer


  10. Posts : 14
    windows 10
    Thread Starter
       #10

    Hi, I have now created a simple volume on the drive which is great, I have a stack of photos I want to back up. Being a fully paid up member of the novice club I thought Diskpart was a program I needed to download as I didn't find it on my laptop. So I Googled it and found it on the Softpedia website and downloaded it from there. I would like to thank Ken and everyone who posted helpful advice, This is an excellent Forum and source of information for Windows 10 users I must say.

    regards, ron
      My Computer


 

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