External Hard Drive Icons have disappeared from Desktop

I have 4 external drives, 3 G-Tech and 1 LaCie, I don't have them on permanently and today I switched them on for my usual backups but the icons didn't appear.My finder prefs shows External disks checked and indeed if I check/uncheck Hard disks they switch on and off but external disks there is nothing.
I can see the drives in Disk utility and can open them from there and my backup app "Databackup" can see them and backup files as normal. I've unplugged/plugged all relevant cables, shut down, restarted, verified disks (no problems) all to no avail. I haven't updated any software since I last used them (yesterday) so I'm at a loss.
Does anyone have any clue, I'd be most grateful for any input.
Thanks
Ed

Hello ED
You don't say which of your Mac's the Drives are connected to or if there FireWire / USB?
If there chained FireWire, disconnect them all and try connecting the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th Drive in the chain directly to the Mac/iMac.
If there USB connected thru a Hub, by pass the Hub and connect them up one at a time directly to the Mac/iMac.
Dennis

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