External hard drive suddenly won't mount

Although I've not had a problem with this drive in the past, it all of a sudden won't mount. It has all my music on and stalled while I was using iTunes, the timer wheel came up and was still the same after 20 minutes so I closed down. Now the drive won't mount at all so I can't even try repairing the disk. I've tried swapping from firewire to USB cables and also going through a hub, neither have worked.
It's a Lacie and the power light stays continuously orange on it and it feels like it's working overtime.
PLEASE HELP!

A little bit more on this... I looked at the instructions for the Lacie and it said that some smaller laptops may require a power cable via a USB port and back into the Lacie, which now works but I'm wondering why this has happened all of a sudden and can I rectify it??
I've deleted a load of stuff off my ibook hard drive, like photos etc, thinking that would help but it hasn't. Plus, I've recently installed an extra 1gb power card.
What can I do to avoid having to plug all these peripherals in to access my music?

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My external hard drive suddenly won't mount.

I have a mac 0sx version 10.5.8. My WD hard drive suddenly won't mount. Tried running a repair with disc utility-no luck.

Your best bet is DiskWarrior...
http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/

Lacie external hard drive suddenly won't mount on iMac 27"

Help! My back up Lacie suddenly won't mount. It shows up on my disk utility (but faded) and I tried to repair it with no benefit. I thought it might be a Lion problem, but my other Lacie is working fine. I tried using a different USB cable and unplugging everything, rebooting etc. Any help would be much appreciated.

There may be hardware problem with the drive. However you can try resetting the SMC. Don't be afraid to reset it 2-3x if the first time doesn't work.
SMC RESET
Shut down the computer.
Unplug the computer's power cord and all peripherals.
Press and hold the power button for 5 seconds.
Release the power button.
Attach the computers power cable.
Press the power button to turn on the computer.
PRAM RESET
Shut down the computer.
Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
Turn on the computer.
Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys. You must press this key combination before the gray screen appears.
Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
Release the keys.

External Hard Drive Suddenly won't mount except if connected via keyboard

Hi there guys. I have a generic USB 2.0 Hard drive enclosure that I've been using successfully with my Macs. Today it doesn't work, on any of them.
I connect it via USB to the back of my iMac, and it will not mount. I checked system information, and it finds: (under USB)
- USB 2.0 Storage Device
And it knows this:
USB 2.0 Storage Device:
Version: 1.03
Bus Power (mA): 500
Speed: Up to 480 Mb/sec
Product ID: 0x5621
Serial Number: 00042222200000157768
Vendor ID: 0x0402
If I plug the hard drive in through my Apple keyboard, it mounts fine, but is SUPER slow, like completely unusable. However in this case, system information says:
USB 2.0 Storage Device:
Capacity: 189.92 GB
Removable Media: Yes
Detachable Drive: Yes
BSD Name: disk1
Version: 1.03
Bus Power (mA): 100
Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec
OS9 Drivers: No
Product ID: 0x5621
Serial Number: 00042222200000157768
S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported
Vendor ID: 0x0402
Volumes:
Backup Disk:
Capacity: 189.8 GB
Available: 44.78 GB
Writable: Yes
File System: Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk1s3
Mount Point: /Volumes/Backup Disk
So.. yeah. I've got important data on this drive, and I seriously have no idea what to do. I've read a few forum posts around the web and have seen similar problems but not solutions posted. Can anyone help?
What should I try?
-Brian

One last question have you tried theMac OS X 10.4.10 Combo Update v1.1 (Intel)
Note: What’s New in this Version
The 10.4.10 Update is recommended for PowerPC and Intel-based Mac computers currently running Mac OS X Tiger. This update includes general operating system fixes, as well as specific fixes or compatibility updates for the following applications and technologies:
- RAW camera support
- Mounting and unmounting external USB devices
- Support for 3rd party software applications
- Security updates
17" iMac Intel Core Duo - 2GB Ram - Mac OS X (10.4.10) - Maxtor 300GB FireWire - Creative Inspire 2.1 - 2G Nano

External hard drive suddenly won't mount, but shows in Disk Utility.

Running OS 10.6.8... Disk Utility sees it and there's no issues when verified or repaired. The partition is grayed out and won't mount through Disk Utility. I've also tried mounting via Terminal, but same result. I've connected other drives, so I know it's not the wires or ports. When I turn the power on, it spins up and seems to be working properly. I don't have another mac to test it on. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Here's the info from Disk Utility:
Name :     BACKUP
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    Disk Identifier :     disk1s10
    Mount Point :     Not mounted
    File System :     Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
    Connection Bus :     FireWire
    Device Tree :     IODeviceTree:/PCI0@0/RP05@1C,4/FWBR@0/FRWR@0/node@30e0f4e010a9d6/sbp-2@c000
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    Can Turn Owners Off :     Yes
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    Supports Journaling :     Yes
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    Disk Number :     1
    Partition Number :     10

You don't have a PowerMac if you have a Mac Pro. You don't have a PowerMac if you have Mac OS X 10.6. PowerMac is the name for the desktop professional Macs prior to mid-2006.   Two possibilities, the drive is dead, or the drive has a bad directory.   For a fee you can isolate either on my FAQ*:
http://www.macmaps.com/directoryfaq.html
* Links to some of my pages may give me compensation.

External Hard Drive Enclosure won't mount

Hi
I have a Western Digital Caviar WD3200JD 1TB SATA hard drive inside an external startech enclosure
http://www.startech.com/item-download/SAT3510U2B-35in-USB-to-SATA-External-Hard- Drive-Enclosure-with-One-Button-Backup.aspx
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I mounts fine on a PC running Vista. I have formatted it as NTFS but it will still not shoe on my mac
Anything else I can try?
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my 12 inch powerbook laptop body was no good, but the hard drive was. I had a powermac g4 tower with a bad harddrive. After researching, I found this site and I mounted the laptop harddrive into the desktop and boom! my old laptop drive booted up on the desktop powermac. here is the link. a 3 yr old can install this it is way too easy, plus it cost 99 Cents. way cheaper than buying an enclosure.
http://www.b2cshop24.com/en/hard-drive-ide-25-to-35-adapter-converter-for-laptop .html

HELP. External hard drive suddenly won't show up on Mac.

So, I left for a few minutes and when I got back, there was that warning on my screen that said the disc wasn't ejected properly, etc. Which was weird because the drive was still plugged in fine. Anyway, when this happens, I usually just pull the hard drive out then plug it back in and it works fine but now it won't show up on the desktop or on the disk utility I got it to show up on disk utility once, but the subheading under the hard drive was greyed out. I could click it but when I tried to run Verify or Repair, nothing would happen. It would show up on the history as "repaired disc" but NOTHING. And I am honestly freaking out Please help, anyone

I'd have to agree with WZZZ. That sounds like either a bad connection, bad cable, or faulty supply. The port could be bad as well but the cable either being bad or not properly plugged in or maybe even worn out. When the "disk ejected" message shows up it's usually because somehow the cable was yanked out of the system while it was plugged in. Intermittenet connections in the cable, particularly in supply lines between the drive and the unit can cause this to happen as well...it's as if you unplugged the external hard drive from the system for a very short time, but the system still picks it up and sees it as bad.
If worse comes to worse, download the hard drive troubleshooting book in the downloads section at:
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External Hard Drive (160GB) won't mount?!

Hi focus,
I am new in MAC OS and I had some difficult to MOUNT my External HARD Drive in MAC OS TIGER 10.4.10 (all updated).
My MAC simply does not recognized my external HD, but recognize when I am using a Virtual machine (Fusion VMware) and running Windows XP. I already try to format in differents formats, FAT/FAT32/NTFS/EXT2 but nether recognize them.
So I ask, there is some "restriction" to mount external IDE drives? I try to use disk utility or ipartition or SupperDuper and no one recognize automaticly.
My original HD was partioned in 2 parts (by me) one for the system 38 GBs and other one 79 GBs for my musics and documents.
If someone has any ideias why this is happen, please help me to solve this problem. Because I need to backup all my data (no actually bootable stuffs) in this external.
Thanks,

Thanks A Brody,
But how can I format my External HD if my MAC can not recognize, even in disk util or ipartition. I think the partition Magic (for windows) can do that, but can not.
So I think, now, the Mediafour MacDrive can do that, is that real? I am Downloading one version from web and I will try in a second. For me is not a problem format in mac format and read in windows within this software, but the problem is recgnize to format in macformat.
I run windows in virtual machine and now I already Install this Macdrive, but does not work, I can not format my external drive with this software. Well I read more and more discussing foruns and also saw you tube videos about formating in mac and it is not a big deal, its should be easy, first of all if mount my external drive to just starting talking about that stuff.
I will get some other "interface" more modern and try to recognize, if do so, maybe I bougth other USB interface. But for now It is to hard stuff has an external 160GB harddrive to backup stuffs.
Thanks and if some one has other suggestion it is always welcome!

Lacie D2 External Hard Drive suddenly won't appear on desktop or profiler??

I started my Mac today- and my external firewire 500 gig LacieD2 did not appear on my desktop. I went to Disk Utilities, and it is not showing up. In the profiler- it is listed as Unknown Device? The blue light is continually flashing. I unplugged it- turned off my computer, waited, and reconnected it. Still nothing. Is this hard drive dead? I have essential information on it that I cannot loose.

I hear it spinning- I think?
That may not be so good because it suggests the power is getting to it and it is something else more critical to the functioning of the drive that is wrong. If it is the enclosure you could try moving it out of the enclosure into a different one, or into the computer.
I just used Disk Warrior to rebuild the directory- no luck.
Ah, so did Diskwarrior see the drive? I didn't think you could see the drive in Disk Utility.
I also replaced the firewire Cable- no luck.
Good try but the flashing blue light suggested something else to me.
I'm now doing to bring it to a local Computer Store to try to retrieve the information.
Try using an application such as [Data Rescue II|http://www.prosofteng.com/products/data_rescue.php] or [FileSalvage|http://subrosasoft.com/OSXSoftware/index.php?mainpage=product_info&productsid=1]. Both have free trial versions that let you see if the software will help before you decide to buy. You will also need a second hard drive equal to or larger in size than your first drive.
I wrote to Lacie- but they are so slow in responding- it will be days.
Ummmm....

My WD 500 GB Ext. Hard drive suddenly won't mount

Hey guys,
I use a WD mybook 500 GB HD through Firewire 800 on My iMac. It is used solely as my Scratch disk for FCP. Suddenly today when i turn on the computer it dosent mount on the desktop along with the MacHD. I ve tried all the repairing permissions, Disk utility. Ive gotten so frustrated i went out and bought another HD, an Iomega. Its not showing up either. I now think its something in the Computer. I have been using the MyBook for about a year now with no problems. Side note...i tried downloading the 10.5.6 update. it hung up while "configuring Installation" Things seem to be going wrong after that. I have also already tried booting up with the Leopard disk into first aid. That didn't help either.
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Thanks Everyone,
Steve

the most important lesson here is that EVERY DRIVE WILL FAIL. It's the nature of the universe. Some drives will fail sooner than others, some drives will give signs that they are beginning to fail, while others will suddenly die a quick death. Do not assume that because you buy one of the brand drives that Jerry recommends that the drive will not fail, although they are definitely more dependable. I've had two drives from one of the brands Jerry mentions fail almost immediately after purchase.
You need to have a workflow that allows you to continue working when you have a drive failure. Make sure all material on video tape is captured with device control, with "abort capture on dropped frames" and "make new clip on timecode break" enabled in your preferences. This will allow you to recapture if necessary. Any files that do not originate in this manner need to be backed up (and even that can be problematic).
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My Western Digital external hard drive suddenly stopped showing up on my Macbook Pro and disappeared from Disk Utility. It works on a PC.

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What is the manufacturer of the external and how old is it? Does it have its own AC power supply or is it USB bus powered?

External hard drives suddenly changed to read only

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About a hundred times with no luck. Some of my research is leading to Western Digital, there may be a problem with the drives' 'smartware' software. I've been using this drive for months and I never used the 'smartware', but I tried it anyway with no luck. I just remembered that four days ago I had this drive plugged this drive into an Iomega wireless storage device and it seemed to work fine. Now the wireless storage device can't find the drive at all. I just need to know if there is a way I can change the permissions back to read/write, otherwise I will have to buy another drive and transfer all the data to the new drive and re-formatt the wd drive.

External hard drive suddenly became "unreadable" and the disk utility offers not repair options. The drive is visible in disk utility but may not be mounted... any suggestions?

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Hi Christina,
It's quite possible the AC PSU has given out, if It's only Bus powered as it appears, that's the worst idea ever & asking for eventual problems.
What Format is it?
Did you install any WD SW?
Your best bet is DiskWarrio...
http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/
But others that may work…
Drive Genius…
http://www.prosofteng.com/products/drive_genius.php
TechTool Pro…
http://www.micromat.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=83

External hard drive suddenly become read only

For those who have been using an external hard drive on OS X (using NTFS file system) without any problem and suddenly one day the system has started mounting it as a read only file system, this is because the file system right now has some inconsistences.
As it happened last night to me i started googling for a quick solution to solve the problem. But i didnt find anything out there. At least at first glance. So then i checked the system logs of the system in order to get some sort of specific information about why that was happening (in OS you have an application that makes so easy to have a look through the system logs and its in /applications/utilities/console.app). In my case, and i repeat, IN MY CASE, the problem was the following:
21/07/11 18:59:02 kernel NTFS-fs warning (device /dev/disk1s1, pid 2140): ntfs_system_inodes_get(): $MFTMirr does not match $MFT. Will not be able to remount read-write. Run ntfsfix and/or chkdsk.
So afterwards once known the problem, was as easy as to mount the external HD in windows and execute the command chkdsk /f (google about the usage of the tool if dont know how it works).
Alternatively, you have the Linux option using the ntfsfix command, but you will need to install the program before that (if dont have it previously in your system) or otherwise you won't be able to use it (sudo apt-get install ntfsprogs)
Hope it helps.
Marc

I got an error message that my External Hard Drive was now 'read only'. Having scoured the various forums looking for clues as to why it had happened I found numerous suggestions, all of which seemed overly complicated and beyond my basic understanding (I'm old enough to remember when Macs 'just worked').
Anyway, among the suggestions on how to correct this I found what seemed like an overly simplified one - 'Don't switch on your external hard drive until after you've booted up'. Since I tend to leave mine on all the time, I immediately turned it off and back on again and ran Time Machine in hope rather than expectation. Would you believe it? It backed up as normal first time. Hope it works for anyone else having the same problem.

WD external hard drive could not be mounted

Hello everyone,
I have a 1TB Western Digital Elements external hard drive, that in the past I had to remove from it's case and use with a SATA cable, because it wasn't getting enough power.
When connecting it like this to my 2012 MacBook Pro I had no issues.
I moved around a lot for a period of time, so it too moved around with me, but I always stored it carefully in my luggage. What I'm getting to is, when I finally settled down, I tried accessing my files and all I got was an initial "wirr" from the drive and then nothing. It won't show up in Finder, but I can see it in Disk Utility. The little light where the power connects turns on and I can feel it working when I touch it.
If I try to mount it though, I get ''The disk “Elements” could not be mounted. Try running First Aid on the disk and then retry mounting.", but First Aid has it's options disabled.
Is there any way I can rescue my data?
Thank you,
Nicole

To anyone who has the same question:
As it seems there's nothing else that can be done but to use a file recovery program such as FileSalvage. I got everything back

External hard drive suddenly won't mount

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