Wd Elements Not Showing Up On Mac

Get a data lifeguard for Mac

How to Fix External Hard Disk Detected But Not Opening? Before initiating the process to fix the issues with your hard drive, some external drives have power cables or a physical power switch, which should be ON at all times for you to perform operations on the disk.
Verify if the drive is getting power, try on a different power outlet. Restart the Mac and reconnect the drive. It could just be a bad drive. October 15, 2015, 2:55am #3. The Elements comes formatted NTFS for Windows. To use on Mac it will need to be reformatted.

Disk Drill brings deleted files back from the dead.

Most of the time, when you connect an external hard drive to your Mac’s USB port, you soon see it mount on the desktop. Apple likes to ensure these are easy to find, so they also appear in the Finder in the left-hand column under Locations.

However, sometimes, an external hard drive doesn't show up. It’s annoying, especially when you need to transfer something right then. And besides, there can be a risk that data on the external USB pen, hard, or flash drive is corrupt, which means you can’t transfer what you need between devices at all.

The Western Digital easystore is a popular line of external storage devices available for Windows 10, Mac, and Linux. The WD external hard drive has up to 18TB of storage space with a USB 3.0 connection. It is the company’s latest rendition of the ever-popular WD Elements and WD My Passport external hard drive product lineup.

Corrupt data can be one reason your Mac won't recognize an external drive, but there are other reasons too. Let’s take a look at why this is happening and how you can fix the external hard drive not showing up problem:

Why your Mac does not recognize external hard drive

Let’s say you’ve encountered the problem of SSD not showing up. There could be a few reasons why SSD isn’t making an appearance (just as any other external drive), the most common being:

There’s something wrong with the cable
There’s a power supply problem
Your drive has been corrupted or broken
The drive is not readable on macOS
NTFS read-only problem.

How to fix an external disk drive that won't show up on a Mac

While it’s impossible to instantly figure out why an external disk drive is not showing up, you have to try to fix the problem.

Access an External Drive Not Showing on Mac

Get a huge set of top utilities for troubleshooting external hard drives not mounting on a Mac

Start with the basics:

Check whether the drive is properly plugged in. It sounds obvious, but since this relies on a wire - either a USB cable or HDMI cable - if it’s not connected properly then it won’t appear on your desktop.
Faulty cable. Assuming it’s plugged in correctly, not wobbly or loose, the cable could be at fault. Try connecting the same device with a different cable.
Damaged USB or flash drive port. It could be a hardware issue with the Mac. If you’ve got another port, try connecting the device to that one.
Reboot your Mac. Sometimes, if a USB disk won't boot, the cause is a macOS issue. Hopefully, some data damage can be fixed by restarting. Choose the Apple menu > Restart. Or press and hold the power button and, when a dialog box appears, click Restart or press R. Restarting your Mac essentially clears your macOS’s memory and starts it up fresh.
Incorrectly formatted drive. Not every external drive is optimized for Macs. It could be that you are trying to connect something only fit to interact with Windows devices. If you’ve got a PC or laptop, it’s worth connecting and seeing if you can access the files through another device. The best way to look for an incorrectly formatted drive is to go to
Apple (in the top toolbar menu) > About This Mac > Storage.
See if the external drive shows up here. For more information, go to the same menu option, then select System Report.
Mac not formatted to display external drives on the desktop. It could be that your Mac already recognizes the device, but just isn’t showing its icon on the desktop screen. Even if that is the case, the drive will still appear in the left-hand column of the Finder menu under Locations. You should be able to access your drive that way, and, in the Finder menu under Preferences > General, you can check External Drives to ensure that from now on it shows up on your desktop too.
Reset NVRAM. To do this, shut down or restart your Mac, switch it back on and immediately press these four keys together for at least 20 seconds: Option, Command, P, and R. It should look as though your Mac has started again; if it has, release the keys when you hear the second startup chime. Hopefully, the hard drive has shown up now.
Check Apple’s Disk Utility to see if an external drive is showing up. Disk Utility is within System Preferences, or you can find it using Spotlight. If it is visible, then click the option to Mount, which should make it visible on the desktop and in the External Drives option in the Finder menu.

Unfortunately, if none of those options has worked and you continue having the external hard drive not showing up problem, then it could have crashed, or be well and truly broken. But there might still be a way you can recover the data on the external drive.

How to fix new hard drive not showing up in Finder

When you connect a drive to Mac, it should appear in Finder under Locations. What to do if external hard drive is not detected? In most cases, when Finder doesn’t see your drive, you just have to change a few things in Preferences. However, sometimes, there are more serious problems such as insufficient power supply. Let’s see how you can fix these things.

How to show connected devices in Finder

Go to the Finder menu > Preferences
In General, click on External disks to ensure that from now on it shows on the desktop.

In the Sidebar tab, you can choose which folders and devices will be shown in the left-hand column of the Finder window.

How to add cloud storages to Finder

You can also mount cloud storage as a local drive on your Mac. By connecting Google Drive, Dropbox, or Amazon to your computer, you get more space for securely accessing and sharing files. For your ease, add cloud drives to Finder with CloudMounter so that you keep them close at hand. You can read detailed instructions on managing cloud storage as local drives here.

Repair the failed external drives with First Aid

The most direct reason your external hard drive could be detected by macOS but can't be opened is the file system problem. If your drive is having such problems, you can try to fix them yourself with First Aid and therefore get access to your files.

First Aid tool will check the disk for errors and then attempt a repair as needed. It helps to verify and repair a range of issues related to startup HD and external drive problems. If you are able to fix the hard drive or SSD in your Mac (or any external drive) using Disk Utility you will hopefully be able to recover your files.

To run Fist Aid on an external hard drive:

Open Disk Utility. You can search for it using Spotlight or via Finder > Go > Utilities
Check on your external hard drive, click the First Aid tab and select Run to start running diagnostics.

How to recover data from a crashed drive

If First Aid has been successful in fixing errors, the external drive should be available to mount. If the utility hasn’t repaired issues, your drive truly is broken or formatted using a file system that the Mac cannot read — in this way you have to recover data from a damaged disk drive.

Thankfully, there is an app for that. Disk Drill is the world’s premier data recovery software for Mac. Powerful enough to retrieve long-lost, mistakenly deleted files from Macs, external hard drives, USB drives, and camera cards.

Get a file recovery app

With Setapp you get a pack of professional tools for file recovery and Mac maintenance.

An easy way to recover lost files on an external hard drive

Here’s how to recover files with Disk Drill (pro version available on Setapp):

Connect your drive to the Mac.
Quit all other applications on the Mac, especially those that may be trying to access the external drive (e.g. iPhoto, Words)
Launch Disk Drill.
Click on the external drive that you are trying to recover files from. If it has partitions, you will see all of them. If, however, you still don’t see any volume to the external drive then you may need to try some of the steps above again or read the Disk Drill Scanning FAQs.
To avoid the external drive being accessed during the recovery process, click Extras next to the drive or drive partition or file, then select Remount Volume As Read Only. A padlock will appear, protecting the drive during the process.
Now click Rebuild (or Recover) next to the file(s) you are trying to recover. Once the scan is finished - it may take some time if the files are large - a list of files will appeal.
Next, click Mount Found Items as Disk button on the bottom-left below the scan results.
Disk Drill 'strongly suggests saving the files to a different drive than the one you are trying to recover files from. Saving to the same drive substantially lowers your chances of recovery.'
A drive icon will appear, which once you double click will give you the option to open the files as you would do before they were lost. Drag them to another location, such as your desktop or a folder on your Mac.
Open the files to ensure they have been recovered properly and safely eject the external drive.

Wd Element Not Showing Up

Disk Drill does have other ways to recover lost files but assuming there are no complications, this method is the most effective.

A few more tips on getting your files back

Macs and third-party apps that look after Macs, such as Disk Drill and iStat Menus come with a S.M.A.R.T. (also known as Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology) status monitor. If a SMART check reports errors, then it could mean the hard drive is at risk of failing completely. Within Disk Utility and Disk Drill, there are several solutions for this: Repair Disk Permissions and Repair Disk. If neither of them works, it’s recommended to back up all of the data from the disk, erase it, then run a SMART check again. The external hard drive should show up as Verified.
Partitions can get lost within hard drives, temporarily hiding all of the information contained within. Disk Drill can help to identify and restore this information.
Within Disk Drill, you can restore data when a hard drive is damaged or add formatting, which is also something Disk Utility can help with.
CleanMyMac, another useful app available from Setapp, can help you identify external hard drive errors and repair them. It is an essential tool worth trying when you’re having external hard drive difficulties.

Try all these apps for free

Get a huge set of top apps for keeping your Mac in shape. Best utilities in one pack, give it a go!

Alternative ways to recover data from an external hard drive

Reset the System Management Controller (SMC) if your Mac shuts down when you plug in an external hard drive. Then use a different port to connect the external hard drive. If you’ve got a battery that you can’t remove:

Shut down and unplug the power adapter
Press and hold Shift-Control-Option and the power button for 10 seconds
Release all keys
Plug the power adapter back in and switch your Mac back on.

For Macs with removable batteries, you need to switch them off, remove the battery, then press and hold the power button for 5 seconds. After that, put the battery back in, plug in the power adapter and switch the power on again.

How to fix external drive NTFS read-only problem

External hard disk detected but not opening? One reason your Mac isn’t recognizing the hard drive is the file format. Windows uses NTFS file formats, while Macs, up until the introduction of Sierra, have used HFS+. Now, Apple has introduced the Apple File System (APFS) for newer operating systems.

If you connect an NTFS drive, your Mac will be able to read it but not edit it. This means you can’t really complete your task (move, copy, or delete any files) as long as you experience the read-only problem. There’s an easy way to fix this with iBoysoft NTFS, an app that enables full read/write support for NTFS drives on Mac.

How to make Ext2/Ext3 drives readable on Mac

The common issue is Ext2- and Ext3-formatted drives are not readable on macOS. There are two ways to access such external drives on your Mac — via Linux OS or FUSE system. The easiest would be installing Linux to a secondary drive or virtual machine.

If you go with Linux installation, dual boot your Mac with Linux on another drive and use FAT32 as a transfer intermediary. If you don’t have the drive to install Linux to, use a virtual machine as an interface for it. Transferring can be done the same way – with FAT32, or via network.

Another option for reading Ext2/Ext3 disks is mounting disk with Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE). Basically, it works as an extra interface enabling file system access via specially installed modules. Here’s how to mount drives with FUSE:

Install FUSE for macOS or MacFUSE as well as a fuse-ext2 module.
Use the following Terminal command to enable Disk Utility’s debug menu and see all partitions: defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUDebugMenuEnabled 1
Attach your Ext2/Ext3 drive and locate the device name via Disk Utility.
In your user account, create a folder to be used as a mount point.
Use the following Terminal command to mount the drive as read-only: fuse-ext2 /dev/disk2s2 /Volumes/mountpoint
For write support, use the command: fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk2s2 /Volumes/mountpoint

And that’s not the only case where Terminal helps you access external drive. Employ the handy all-powerful Terminal, which always comes forward with solutions for difficult problems. Especially if System Information does recognize the USB or hard drive, but continues to hide it from you, disconnect the drive and try to find it using the Terminal, which you can find in Applications > Utilities.

Once in the Terminal, type in the command diskutil list
A list with information about volumes and drives should appear
Look for a section labelled /dev/disk_ (external, physical)
Make a note of the whole line after the word disk
Now put the following command into the Terminal diskutil info disk followed by the number or digits assigned to that disk
Now you should see detailed information about the drive, therefore confirming that your Mac can and does recognize it
Eject using the Terminal by entering the command diskutil eject disk followed by the number or digits assigned to that disk
Physically remove the disk from your Mac
Plug it back in and your Mac should recognize it.

Console is also reliable when it comes to solving tricky problems, although it isn’t always that easy to use. You can find Console under Applications > Utilities > Console or via Spotlight. Console shows if an external drive or any error is detected under the Errors and Faults tab. If no errors show up, then the problem is not caused by the device.

How to fix insufficient power supply

Another thing that might cause USB drive not showing up is that your USB cable is just not powerful enough. Typically, a USB 1.0 or 2.0 works, but there are drives that require more power. In this case, you should get another connector or use some type of USB hub to increase the power supply. If you still can’t access external hard drive, consider switching to another Mac.

Conclusion

Hopefully, we’ve covered the topic so you don’t have to google “external hard drive disappear from the computer” ever again. There are lots of potential solutions for a Mac not reading/writing an external hard drive. If you’re trying to connect an NTFS drive, do it with iBoysoft NTFS for Mac. If you need to add cloud storage, CloudMounter will help you. Most importantly, you’ll never have to worry about a crashed or corrupted external drive because Disk Drill will help you recover all the data stored on it.

iBoysoft NTFS, CloudMounter, Disk Drill, and other powerful apps such as CleanMyMac X are all available via Setapp, a productivity suite that solves your tasks with apps. Give it a try for seven days free and fix all your Mac issues in one go.

Setapp uses cookies to personalize your experience on our website. By continuing to use this site, you agree to our cookie policy.

'I have a WD My Passport Ultra 1TB portable drive for storing important personal files. Suddenly, the WD Passport ultra is not showing up on my PC.
How do I fix My WD Passport Ultra not showing up on my computer?'

When your WD My Passport Ultra hard drive or external hard drive is not showing up, you can neither access nor use the drive on your computer.

But don't worry. Follow this guide, you'll learn the causes and fixes to the WD Passport Ultra external hard drive not showing up error on your own.

Here is the complete guide to making your WD Passport external hard drive detected again:

PAGE CONTENT:

Fix 1. Add New Drive Letter
Fix 2. Fix Corrupted File System/Bad Sector
Fix 3. Plug WD My Passport Halfway-in-USB
Fix 4. Try a Different USB Cable/Port or PC
Fix 5. Update WD External Device Driver & Reinstall BUS Controllers
Fix 6. Send Disk for Repair

Some of you may also want to learn what causes the wd external hard drive not showing up on the computer. Continue reading and check it out.

Why is My WD Passport Not Showing Up?

We consulted many experienced users and IT professionals, and we concluded the causes below. Check out why is your WD Passport Ultra external not showing up:

1. A faulty USB port/cable, or a damaged USB hub on PC
2. No drive letter is assigned to WD Passport drive
3. Corrupted file system or bad sectors makes WD drive unreadable
4. WD drive driver is out of date
5. Universal USB controllers drivers are outdated

These causes may also lead to some of your other devices malfunctioning, such as:

So how to fix these errors and make your WD Passport Ultra external hard drive show up on PC again? Follow through the tutorials below to get rid of this issue immediately.

Part 1. Check The State of WD External Hard Disk in Disk Management

Connect the WD external hard drive to your computer via the USB cable. Follow steps here to check the state of your WD external hard drive in Disk Management:

Step 1. Press Windows + R keys, type diskmgmt.msc in the Run box, and click 'OK'.

Step 2. In Disk Management, locate and check the state of your WD external hard drive.

Part 2. Fix WD My Passport External Hard Drive Not Showing Up Error

Check the state of your not showing up or not detected WD My Passport Ultra external hard drive and refer to the right fix to make your drive work normally again.

Fix 1. Add New Drive Letter to Make WD Passport External Hard Drive Showing Up

Applies to: Fix WD passport external hard drive not showing up due to the drive letter confliction.

If your WD displays as 'New Volume' with no drive letter in Disk Management, it won't show up in File Explorer. Don't worry.

You can change or add a new drive letter so to make WD passport detectable and accessible again in Windows PC:

Step 1. Press Win + R keys, type diskmgmt.msc in the Run dialog, click 'OK' to open Disk Management.

Step 2. Right-click on WD drive which fails to show up and choose 'Change Drive Letter and Paths...'.

Step 3. Click 'Add', set a new drive letter to assign to the WD external drive, and click 'OK'.

If the WD drive has already been assigned with a letter, click 'Change' to choose another letter for it. After this, restart your PC and check if you can visit the WD external hard drive in Windows File Explorer.

Fix 2. Fix Corrupted File System/Bad Sector

Applies to: Fix WD passport external hard drive not showing up due to file system error or bad sectors.

If the system files are corrupted or the WD device contains bad sectors, Windows disk management may detect it as '*Others' or RAW. Your computer may not even able to detect it from File Explorer.

EaseUS partition manager software with its Check File System feature can help. As long as your Disk Management can detect it, you can apply this tool to fix the corrupted file system and bad sectors on WD hard drive.

Follow to see how to fix corrupted system files and bad sectors on WD device:

After this, you can check the drive. If your files were missing, move to Part 3 and apply reliable data recovery software to bring back all your WD external hard drive data.

Fix 3. Plug WD My Passport Halfway-in-USB

This method is more like a temporary solution. According to a user's feedback on a forum, in this 'bizarre way', his computer successfully recognized the external hard drive. Here's how to do it.

Step 1. Plug the USB cable halfway through any one of your computer's USB ports.

Step 2. Wait for the WD hard drive to show up in File Explorer.

Step 3. When you see your hard drive, push the USB completely into the USB port.

It might be unreasonable, but quite a lot of people solved their problem with this trick. Have a try on it!

Fix 4. Try a Different USB Cable/Port or PC

When your WD hard drive neither shows up in File Explorer nor Disk Management, you can try to change the USB cable, try another USB port, or a new PC to see if the drive can be read or not.

Step 1. Switch a USB port/cable and replug it to your computer.

If the drive can be read via new a USB cable or on a new PC, then the drive is working fine. The problem is with the USB cable.

Step 2. Reconnect the WD drive via a new USB hub or to a new PC.

If the WD Passport drive shows up, it is the damaged USB hub that stops WD from showing up.
If the WD passport is not detected either on your current or the new PC, replace the WD drive with a new one.

Fix 5. Update WD External Device Driver & Reinstall BUS Controllers

When the WD Passport drive is not working, it might be caused by the outdated device drivers. So the best way is to update its driver via the following three paths:

#1. Download and Install WD Device Driver:

Step 1. Connect the problematic WD external hard drive to your PC.

Step 2. Right-click on the Windows icon and select 'Device Manager'.

Step 3. Find and expand Disk Drivers, Portable Devices, Universal Serial USB Controllers, or Other devices.

See if the WD external hard drive is shown as an 'Unknown' device.

Step 4. Right-click on Unknown or not working WD external hard drive, select 'Properties'.

Step 5. Go to the Details tab, set Property to 'Hardware Ids'.

Step 6. Right-click the top Value and click 'Copy'.

Step 7. Paste it into a browser and search for the correct device driver.

Step 8. Find and download the correct WD device driver and install it on your PC.

After this, restart your computer. And everything shall work fine with your WD My Passport Ultra drive.

#2. Update WD Device Driver from Device Manager:

Step 1. Right-click on the Windows icon and select 'Device Manager'.

Step 2. Expand Device Manager and right-click the WD My Passport Ultra drive.

Step 3. Select 'Update driver'.

Step 4. Select 'Search automatically for updated driver software', wait for the process to complete.

#3. Uninstall/Reinstall USB Controllers

When the Universal USB Bus Controllers are outdated, it may also stop your WD passport from being detected or showing up. So you can try to uninstall and reinstall USB controllers:

Step 1. Right-click on the Windows icon and select 'Device Manager'.

Why Won't My Wd Elements Work On Mac

Step 2. Expand Universal Serial Bus controllers, right-click on USB controllers of the WD drive, and select 'Uninstall device'.

Repeat to uninstall each USB controller one by one.

Step 3. Restart the computer and Windows will automatically reinstall the USB controllers of your WD drive.

After this, you shall be able to visit and access saved data on your WD Passport Ultra drive normally by then.

Notice:: If the WD external hard drive is still not showing up in both File Explorer and Disk Management after trying all these solutions, send your drive for repair as shown in Fix 3.

Fix 6. Send 'Unknown' & Not Detected WD External Hard Disk for Repair

If your WD external hard drive displays as 'Unknown' in disk management, the last thing you can try is to send the disk for repair.

You have two options for this issue:

Option 1. Beyond the Warranty: Send WD external disk for repair in a local repair center
Option 2. Within the Warranty: Send WD external disk back to its manufacturer

Part 3. Get Data Off WD External Disk and Format It to Work Again

If your WD hard drive shows up and you can access the disk again. Take the last guide in this part to fully protect your files and make the WD external hard drive viable for saving and editing data again.

#1. Get Data Off WD External Hard Drive

Here are two ways that you can fully get files from your WD external hard drive:

1. Open and copy data from your WD hard drive to another storage device as a backup.
2. Recover lost files from WD drive with EaseUS file recovery software.

Note that, if you lost some valuable files during the process, don't worry. Professional file recovery software can scan and bring back your files in 3 steps:

Step 1. Choose the external hard drive

Since you're going to recover data from an external hard drive, you need to correctly connect the drive to your Windows computer.
Run EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard and choose the exact external drive where you lost data.
Click Scan.

Step 2. Check the scan results

The software will immediately start scanning the selected drive for all lost data. During the scan, you can see more and more data showing up in the results. The Filter feature is there for you to quickly locate the files of one kind, such as Pictures, Word/Excel/PDF documents, Videos, etc.

Step 3. Preview and recover data

Double-clicking a file will allow you to preview its content.
Choose the file(s) and click Recover.
Select a different drive to save the recovered files instead of the original one.

Remember to save the recovered files to another secure location and then move to the next guide to format your WD My Passport external hard drive to usable again.

#2. Format WD External Hard Drive to Usable

Here, you may also let EaseUS Partition Master help. It's easy and efficient in formatting a disk:

Step 1. Launch EaseUS Partition Master, right-click the partition on your external hard drive/USB/SD card which you want to format and choose the 'Format' option.

Step 2. Assign a new partition label, file system (NTFS/FAT32/EXT2/EXT3), and cluster size to the selected partition, then click 'OK'.

Step 3. In the Warning window, click 'OK' to continue.

Step 4. Click the 'Execute Operation' button in the top-left corner to review the changes, then click 'Apply' to start formatting your external hard drive/USB/SD card.

After this, you can save the data back to your WD external hard drive again.

Make Your WD External Hard Drive Show Up and Work Now

On this page, we explained why is WD My Passport Ultra external hard drive not showing up on Windows PC and provided 6 practical fixes for you to follow and make the drive show up again.

As a beginner, we suggest that you follow the whole guide one by one. These fixes also work to resolve the same issue on all brands of external hard drive, internal hard drive, USB, or SD card.

Now, it's your turn. Take steps to fix your not showing up WD external hard drive and make it work again without losing any data.

Loadvina30