External hard drive won't always register

I have a WD Green WD15EADS 1.5TB hard drive in an Iocell MyDisk Solo enclosure connected to my mac mini via USB. When I first turn on the enclosure, it will show up on my desktop and I can backup right away. But after the initial backup, usually a few minutes later, It says it can't backup or can't find the drive, and it won't even eject properly. Basically, Time Machine won't work in backing up on a schedule and I have to do it manually everytime I remember to do it. This of course takes longer since it will be days or weeks between backups. It's like after a few minutes of not using the external drive, it loses the connection, and I miss out on the full advantage of regular backups. Has anyone else experienced this? Are plain external drives (not internal drives inside enclosures) more reliable? It was just more affordable this way.

I would suspect something about the enclosure. The one you are using does not have much of a track record (online at least). You could try using the external drive with another computer to see if it behaves the same. If it does, it's either the drive or its enclosure. This is to try to distinguish that type of issue from an issue with your Mac.
There are literally millions of users using external drives for backup, storage, etc. They don't see the symptoms you are seeing. The vast majority purchase the external drive already installed in an enclosure from the manufacturer. The advantage of this is that these completely contained units are tested by the manufacturer and have a good track record. I have used dozens of external drives that were sold already in an enclosure over the past decade or so and have never seen the symptoms you describe. WD makes a variety of USB drives already in enclosures and they have a good track record.
In principle, you should be able to take a bare drive and put it in an enclosure and it should work. In practice, the firmware in the enclosure needs to be correct, everything needs to be connected right, and you may be introducing an extra step and potentially a complication that you would not have when obtaining an external drive in a USB enclosure from the manufacturer.

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External Hard Drive Won't Mount- Need to recover files

Hello Everyone,
I am hoping that one of you fine mac experts may be able to assist ~
Problem: External Seagate FreeAgent Desktop USB external hard drive
won't mount on desktop=ie: no access to my important files.. Please Help!
Details:
External seagate freeagent 500 GB Desktop USB HD ( only 2 months old)
(using for document / file backup-not as a startup disc)
on my Mac G3 350 MZ Blue & White Tower /768 ram/ running OSX 10.1.5 & OS9.2~
~
Problem: Started using the external 500 GB HD 2 months ago -with no problems-until this morning. Tried to double click to open it to access files
and got the "beach ball of death" and needed to restart.
My trusty G3 started up fine, however, the external HD was now
not showing up on the desktop as normal. I troubleshooted -by restarting,
trying different a/c plugs/ different USB ports , ran disk utility..called
seagate -not much help . Seagate said to try the HD on another mac-which I did-
a G5 tower- same problem.
~
The External hard drive will show up in disk utility, but is grayed out.
and when click "mount" same two messages keep showing:
message 1: "a disk attempting to mount as unknown has failed verification or has failed to
mount.please use disk utility to check the disk"
~
message 2- when unplugging and repluggin the usb in-and upon
restart:" you have inserted a disk containg no volumes that mac osx
can read to use unreadable volumes,click initialize to continue with the disk inserted ,click continue"
~
( I really need access to these files- and do not want to re-initialize the HD!!)
I ran Disk Utility /first aid "verify & repair , the following info came up:
Repairing disk "main backup 2007 ".
Checking HFS Plus volume.
Checking Extents Overflow file.
Checking Catalog file.
Invalid key length ( <<<IN RED )
Repair completed. "
~~
Though it said the repair was completed, the "invalid key length" issue
still comes up when re-running disk utility...Hard drive would still not
mount on desktop-even after restarting .
~~~~~
If there is a mac genius out there that can help?- it would be greatly
appreciated. I have tried to call seagate several times in the last several hours-
1st time-they disconnected me after being on hold 10 minutes-2nd call
I was put on hold for 40 minutes ..Finally spoke to someone ( they are not mac users or mac experts!)and he said I would need to send it to Seagate's Data Recovery-... for a fee of course!
~~~
At this point, I am hoping to just get the files and photos off
the hard drive- I heard about Disk Warrior-should I use that and if so
what version?
Thank you very much!
L

Will zapping the PRAM be of any use in getting the external to mount on the desktop?
Your external Hard drive is already recognized. But it cannot be mounted on the desktop due to its directory damage. You can certainly Zap the PRAM, and it will not hurt anything, but I am skeptical that it will change the situation.
Do you think the Disk Warrior 4.0 cd will even work on my G3 350MHZ running Mac OS 10.1.5?
If you boot from the CD and run it from the CD, absolutely yes. If you attempt to INSTALL it from a download or a CD, probably not.
Have you ever used Disc Warrior and is using it complicated?
I own and use Disk Warrior. You select the drive to be rebuilt, it builds a proposed new directory from the information and file fragments available.
When complete, it will provide a list of problems encountered, tell you what files have been placed in the "Rescued Items" folder, and allow you too look at your drive using the proposed new directory. Your only decision is whether the new directory seems to be an improvement over the old \[in your case, hopelessly corrupted] directory. You then tell it whether to replace the old directory with the proposed new directory, or to abandon its work and leave your Hard Drive unchanged.
Is there a good chance that the ext HD will still have my files on it- or do you think from what I've described that they are gone ?
From what you have described, your files are very likely to still be there. Sometimes in a situation like this, a handful of files cannot be recovered.
My other thought was to take the external HD there and have them try to recover the files.
Make sure you completely understand the costs involved. File recovery using a service like DriveSavers can run into many hundreds of dollars. They are prepared to disassemble your drive in a clean room and replace controller boards and read/write heads to achieve success. Your drive has serious, but not fatal, Directory damage. The Hardware, and most of your files, are likely just fine.

External hard drive won't mount, even after disk repair.

My Toshiba external hard drive won't mount on my MacBook Pro 10.8.5. I can see it in my disk repair, and when I repair, "the partition map appears to be ok." But I can't access the icon to be able to open the hard drive contents on my desktop. Help!

Hello maccynicwhoalwayshasmacs,
Thanks for the question. After reviewing your post, it sounds like trouble with an external HD mounting. I would recommend that you read this article, it may be able to help you resolve or isolate the issue.
USB and FireWire Quick Assist
Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.
Have a nice day,
Mario

After installing snow leopard my external hard drive won't show up on screen or backup

Afer installing leopard my external hard drive won't show up on my desk top. It also won't backup my hard drive with time machine. I need help.

Try going to finder preferences, general, make sure show these items on desktop external disks is clicked. You can also go to sidebar (same pane) and click it there so it will show when you open your HD. Time Machine>system preferences>time machine>turn it off click select disk, make sure the correct disk is selected, the turn TM back on. Hope this helps.

External hard drive won't shut down after switch from OS10.5 to OS10.4.11

i recently chanded my OS from 10.5 to 10.4.11 (as a programme i want to use is not compatible with leopard), but since i have done this my external hard-drive won't shut down automatically when i shut down my mac. i have to switch it off at the plug instead.
can anyone suggest how i can get it to do this again?
i'm a little concerned that i'm damaging the external drive by turning it off manually all the time..
thanks

Some hard drives shut off with shutdown, some don't. Sometimes hard drives that did shut off with one system will not do the same with a different system. My hard drives which did shut off, prior to 10.5 now stay on.
This is not really a problem as all hard drives spin down after 10- 20 minutes when not in use, whether your computer is on or off. Leaving the drive on is fine, shutting it off manually is fine.
-mj
[email protected]

External hard drive won't unmount for disk utility.

Im not sure if this is the right topic area but I have a white macbook and my external hard drive won't unmount. I want to erase it via disk utility but it keeps telling me other programs are using it.

Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder.
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (for Intel Macs) or APM (for PPC Macs) then click on the OK button. Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.

I just installed OS X Yosemite and now my WD My Book Live external hard drive won't re-connect. My Safari keeps kicking out and giving me error message after error message and my computer is really slow. How do I resolve? Can I uninstall this ?

I just installed OS X Yosemite and now my WD My Book Live external hard drive won't re-connect. My Safari keeps kicking out and giving me error message after error message and my computer is really slow. How do I resolve? Can I uninstall this ? I had to re-connect my iMovie t

USB2.0 PCI cards that use the NEC chipset seem to give the least amount of problems for Mac users.
OWC have a few different ones for sale.
http://eshop.macsales.com/Search/Search.cfm?Ntk=Primary&Ns=P_Popularity%7c1&Ne=5 000&N=7057&Ntt=USB2**0**cards
Do you also connect the external USB drive to the AC power as well while you use it ?
Sometimes USB external drive problems are resolved simply by plugging them into the mains power and trying again.
Stewie
Message was edited by: stewiesno1

External Hard Drive won't mount on desktop!

Hey, guys.
I ran into a problem this morning that I've never ran into before and I wasn't sure where to write it but I thought this is best.
Here it goes...
Last night I had a power surge and when I restarted my computer, my external hard drive did not mount on my desktop. I than proceeded with restarting my computer, I relinked all my connections and I cant seem to get it fixed. I have a lot of material on my external drive that I dont have backed up (I know, a stupid move) anyways, I dont want to lose that information. Also, when I open up disk utility, the icon for my external drive is there and the partition I made for my external drive shows up also but the title of my partition for my external hard drive is not in bolded font. I tried to click the button to mount my external drive cause the specs tell me that it is not mounted but when I press the mount button, it does nothing. I than tried clicking the unmount button and than restart my computer and still nothing.
What problem am I facing and how can it be fixed?
Thanks.

Dear Jason,
Gary's advised is, IMHO, a very sound one.
The only thing I can think of about your problem, given the information you have provided us, is to run Disk Warrior on your external HD.
In fact, DW is particularly indicated in events, like:
"...you should run DiskWarrior when you suspect that there is directory damage on one of your disks. Directory damage can result in the disk not mounting (not appearing on the desktop when the computer is started), missing files or folders, an inability to move or copy files, or crashes when files are used...".
You could actually buy your copy of DW Licence on-line and download it directly onto your internal HD, starting from this "Information you must read before you make your purchase" page. A hardware copy of the software you have so purchased, will follow by postal service (or currier, if so you choose), shortly.
Follow all the instructions you will find in the download to install the DW software onto your main internal HD and then run it on your external hard drive.
DW has saved my data several times and in similar situations as you are experiencing. IMHO, you should seriously give it a try and, even in the unfortunate event it does not manage to solve your problem, it is one of those Mac OSX utilities which ANY Mac power user MUST have handy at all times.
So, no matter what, my opinion is that it is always well-spent-money those used to purchase your copy of DW: in the long run, you won't regret it.
In the event that even DW is unable to retrive your precious data, my suggestion is to contact Micro Com data recovery. It's going to cost you some money, but if you make a leaving out of the data you've lost on your external hard drive, it's going to be worth it.
All the best.
Costa

Fantom external hard drive won't mount

I am using an imac G3 with OS 10.3.9. Until yesterday my Fantom external hard drive mounted. I dismounted it and turned it off. I went to turn it back on later and it won't mount. I selected initialize from the dialogue box that says it won't mount and when disk utility comes up it show the two icons for the internal hard drive and just one for the external so I can't do anything with it. Thanks for your help.
imac Mac OS X (10.3.9)
imac Mac OS X (10.3.9)
imac Mac OS X (10.3.9)

Thought you could use this info about getting FireWire to work!
First, you should always Repair Permissions in Disk Utility before and after any update; I would do that now. If you installed your update with FireWire plugged in, your Mac may not recognize it anymore.
Try resetting your FireWire ports by disconnecting all FW devices, shut down your Mac and unplug it from AC power (wall socket) for 30 minutes. plug it back in and try FW.
If that did'nt work, download the combo update from this site (yours may be corrupt), not Software Update, disconnect all firewire + USB devices except keyboard + mouse, Repair Permissions, re-install update, Repair Permissions again + try. Yours is the 10.3.9 Combo update. Others reading, download the Combo that applies to your system.
If that still did'nt get it Zap the PRAM. While restarting Mac hold down the following key combo Command-Option-P-R. Keep holding those keys down till you hear the second start-up chime, then release.
For those of you with Macs that are not PowerBooks or iBooks, a bad internal battery can cause FireWire to not be recognized, so make sure it's good!
Good Luck!
Cheers!
DALE
p.s. Hi to you too Sherry! Keep up the good work!

External Hard Drive won't stop sleeping

This is really frustrating me. I have my settings unchecked to allow hard disk to sleep, also my computer is set to never sleep. However whenever I try to access my external drive, I always have to wait several seconds for it to spin up. It's as if OSX is ignoring my preferences and just putting it to sleep still. I don't understand. It's really annoying to have to deal with the lag of drive spin-up all the time. What do I have to do to get my external hard drive to NEVER sleep, so it's always immediately accessible? It's a Samsung Story 1.5gb external USB, not that it should make any difference...

jamesdstark2 wrote:
This is really frustrating me. I have my settings unchecked to allow hard disk to sleep
Some external HDs respond to that setting, some don't. Some won't respond unless you disable the built-in sleep (or "spin down") software. As Baltwo says, check with the maker.

Two seperate external hard drives won't mount

HELP!
Neither of my external hard drives, both AC powered, suddenly won't mount. I've swapped all the cables and ports but no joy - it can only be the mac. Any idea?! Maybe I haven't mounted them since the last software/ security update, I can't remember...
I feel like everything is breaking down one by one and it always seems to be the result of an update.

Ok, a small amount of success.... I've figured out that it's the USB adapter (Apple - The one I got with my ipod). So I changed the fuse in the actual plug, and that works fine with the laptop charger connected but not the USB part of the adapter plug - the actual square adapter than hooks onto the plug... So what can I do about that? is there another fuse inside that? I can't seem to get it open - Do I just need to buy a new one?

External hard drive won't erase and now is not recognized

My 1 TB WD external hard drive was partitioned into 2 partitions. The top partition was for Time Machine, the bottom for my personal files. Those personal files are not on my regular hard drive so I decided I needed to get another external hard drive to back them up. I bought a 2 TB WB and set up Time Machine with that drive to back up my computers hard drive as well as my 1 TB external hard drive. Through my online research I discovered I couldn't make the 1 TB into one partion without deleting my personal files, so I figured since it was backed up on the 2 TB it would be okay. Just to be safe I backed it up onto a 500 GB Seagate as well (this drive crashed a while ago and then randomly started working again, so not too trustworthy - if anyone knows how I can make it trustworthy again, that would be fantastic). Then I partioned the 1 TB into 1 partition. Success. I went to erase it and selected Zero Out Data. This failed "Volume Erase failed with the error: Disk object invalid or inable to serialize." And then my hard drive disappeared. I've been able to open it in Disk Utility and partion it again into 1 partition, but each time I try to erase it, it always fails. Is something wrong with my drive? Is this external hard drive truthworthy to hold important files without crashing again?
Here's a screenshot of what happens when it fails. Yay.
After the Zeroing out doesn't work, this box pops up. And then my drive disappears from the desktop.
At one point the partition failed, but it seems to have gotten over that. Although each time I try to erase and it fails, I have to rename and repartition my 1 TB external hard drive so it shows up on the desktop again.

I came back from uni and it looks like the writing zero's was effective. There were no "failure" boxes. And here's the final reading for the partition and then the whole drive. Does anyone know why it says 12 folders and 66 files (more filed than when it started writing)? Does this mean it's not zero-ed out? Can I use this external hard drive?

My external hard drive won't show up on my MacBook Pro

So, I'm trying to transfer my music from my PC to my MacBook Pro. I put all my music on an external hard drive, but for some reason when I plug it into my MacBook it won't show up on the desk top. I've already changed my preferences in Finder so that hard drives and disks will show on the desktop, but still nothing. I looked in utilities to see if the hard drive was there, and still nothing. The hard drive is a Toshiba and is fairly new, the light goes on when I plug it into my laptop, so I'm very confused. Can anyone help me with my predicament?

Check that the data cable is securely inserted at both ends.
Try a different cable.
If you're connecting the drive through a hub, connect it directly to a built-in port on the Mac.
If you're connecting it directly, try a different port.
Disconnect all other devices on the bus, or as many as possible.
Test the drive with another Mac. Test another drive with this Mac.
If the drive is bus-powered, but has an AC adapter, connect the adapter.
Boot into Recovery and launch Disk Utility. Is the drive recognized?
If the drive doesn't work under any of the above conditions, and if another drive does work with the same Mac, then the drive has failed. You may be able to salvage the mechanism by removing it from the enclosure and installing it in another one, or in a drive dock.

WD 1TB External Hard Drive won't work with Snow Leopard

Hi all,
I recently purchased a Western Digital 1TB External Hard Drive. It came formatted for Windows with NTFS, but I didn't think this was a problem as the packaging stated it could easily be reformatted for Mac OS. To cut a long story short, it couldn't. When I plugged it in to my Mac (iMac 21" i3) and tried to use Disk Utility to reformat it, partition it, whatever, it just wouldn't work always returning some sort of error. I resorted to using a Gparted Live CD and succesfully formated it to HFS+ but yet when I plugged it into my Mac it wouldn't mount the disk. After following advice to let Disk Utility 'Repair' the disk, this is the output:
Verify and Repair volume “external”
Checking non-journaled HFS Plus Volume.
Checking extents overflow file.
Unused node is not erased (node = 1458) [In red]
Checking catalog file.
Unused node is not erased (node = 5) [In red]
Checking multi-linked files.
Checking catalog hierarchy.
Invalid directory item count [In red]
(It should be 1 instead of 0)
Checking volume bitmap.
Volume bitmap needs minor repair for orphaned blocks [In red]
Checking volume information.
Invalid volume free block count [In red]
(It should be 244164065 instead of 244148705)
The volume external was found corrupt and needs to be repaired. [In red]
Error: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files. [In red]
If anyone knows what this means, and more importantly anything I can do to try and fix this, I would really really appreciate the help!
(Obviously I see it says reformat the disk, but this is easier said than done. Now Gparted crashes when it tries to read it and Disk Utility hangs indefinitely if I try to do anything to it)

asad.a wrote:
I believe the reasons behind this must have something to do with the errors highlighted by the repair process (as copied above)- errors I don't understand.
Disk Utility can't repair NTFS volumes.
If the drive is not seriously damaged ...
Go to Disk Utility
Click on the external Drive (not on the existing partition)
Click on Partition section in Disk Utility
In the Pane under "Current Scheme" highlite the Partition and then click the "-" (minus) sign down left.
Click on the dropdown "Current Scheme" and choose a matching scheme
On Format choose "Mac OS extended journaled"
Click "Apply"
Message was edited by: lupunus / typo's fixed

External Hard drive won't eject.

hi, im new to the boards. just having an issue with my new external hard drive. everytime i use it or i use my cf card reader which is firewire it won't eject either. i've read there are special commands to go in and see what applications are running and i've tried using disk utility to eject the harddrive. nothing seems to work. ive got all my photos from jobs on this harddrive and im worried that by pulling the cord or switching off the device is eventually going to render all my data corrupt or potentially erase it all. if you know step by step instructions to putting commands in to eject these things it would be of great help. im on 10.3.9 ibook g4.
the error is basically telling me the drive is still in use and can nnot eject. not sure why because there are no other apps running?

Well i think i figured out what was causing the issue. i had a jpeg in the trash. i tried to delete it but it states an error message that the jpeg is being used in another application. so i pulled it out of the trash then plugged my external harddrive back in and the tested it to see if it would eject properly and it did! so now i just need to figure out how to delete that jpeg? so the fact that this jpeg is somehow tied up in an application was causing my card reader and external harddrive to not eject properly? strange. thanks for the tip though. appreciate your input.

External hard drive won't always register

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