Western Digital External Hard Drive not Recognized by Windows XP: Does not show up in My Computer or Device Manager.

Anonymous
2010-05-13T01:16:46+00:00

My external hard drive does not run automatically when plugged into my USB port on my computer.  It is not recognized in my computer and it does not show up in Device Manager.  I have applied a hot fix for this problem and it was stated that problems are detected but after applying the hot fix the problem still exits!  HELP.  I went to Western Digital for this problem and they stated in their FAQ's that it is a Windows problem and that the drivers might be corrupted.  This is probably true as the device works perfectly on other computers.  Now what do I do?

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Devices and drivers

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Anonymous
2010-08-11T06:46:44+00:00

Here’s the actual steps needed to get your external USB drive assigned a letter in Windows XP if it does not show up in Windows Explorer:

1)     Right-click on “My Computer”

2)     Click “Manage”

3)     Double-click “Disk Management”

4)     You will probably see Disk 0 and Disk 1 for your primary hard drive. Go to lower right portion of box and scroll down until you see Disk 2. It is probably your USB drive without a letter.  It should show the size of the drive.

5)     Right-click in the left portion of that drive box (Disk 2)

6)     Click “Initialize” and “OK” in the next dialog box. This takes just a few seconds and it should now say “Online” in the “Disk 2” box.

7)     Right-click in the box to the right side of the “Disk 2” box (where it shows your disk drive size and says “Unallocated”.

8)     Click “New Partition” and a “New Partition Wizard” will open up.

9)     Click “Next”, then select “Primary Partition” and click “Next”.

10) Verify partition size (use entire disk size available unless you are creating multiple drives) and Click “Next”.

11) Assign drive letter (“F” is typical if CD-Rom is E) and click “Next”.

12) Format this partition with “NTFS”, “Default”, “New Volume” and click “Next”.

13) Then click “Finish” to exit the wizard and start formatting.

14) Be patient… this can take awhile (it took just over an hour for a 320GB drive).

15) When done, you should see an icon for your drive in Windows Explorer!

Hope this helps!!

Doc

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  1. Anonymous
    2013-02-02T12:06:34+00:00

    THANKS A LOT!!! IT WORKS :-)

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  2. Anonymous
    2013-02-25T17:57:49+00:00

    Make sure your external drive was not formatted using any other OS ( like MAC). you need to reformat it using NTFS.

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  3. Anonymous
    2013-07-11T14:08:55+00:00

    When i try to right click the drive there is no "initialize? option so this is where i am very confused. it has a letter assigned to it but it is being read as a "blank" usb drive. no memory whatsoever. all i want to do is format the darn thing but there is no option when i right click it. PLEASE HELP!!!

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  4. Anonymous
    2013-08-08T18:01:07+00:00

    I have found my external hard drive using steps 1-4, but will steps 6-14 erase all the files that are already on the hard drive? I can't lose these backup files.

    Many thanks in advance.

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