PC wont detect external hard drive

Try a different usb port. Maybe a 1TB external hd is too big for your old computer to recognize. Old computers cannot handle a drive that large.

Repair laptop hard drive is not detected

Solution 1
1. Open the hard drive cover (remove two screws)
2. Remove the hard drive screws, then slide the hard drive (see the arrows)
3. Wait 15 minutes, then plug the hard drive
4. Turn on the laptop.





Solution 2
1. Remove the hard drive
2. Clean the gold layer with a pencil eraser
3. Plug the hard drive, then turn on your laptop



Solution 3
1. Remove the hard drive
2. Plug jumper on the hard drive
3. Plug the hard drive, then turn on your laptop



Solution 4
1. Remove the hard drive, plug the external cable.
2. Connect the hard drive to another computer, with USB connection
3. If the hard drive can be detected, eject the hard drive
4. Plug the hard drive to the laptop, then turn on
Intended to make the hard drive can work with the help of another computer



Solution 5
1. Remove the laptop hard drive
2. Plug the laptop hard drive to my PC.
SATA1 - PC hard drive
SATA2 - Laptop hard drive
3. Boot the computer from a PC hard drive
The purpose of using a PC computer main-board as drivers of the laptop hard drive.



I hope this information helps. Thank you for using FixYa!

The light is the power status light, if it doesn't lights up fully it means that the power circuits inside the drive are incapable of delivering the power to the hard disk because either they have been fried or the USB circuits inside the pc have failed. Simple test to determine which: plug the drive in another pc - if it behaves the same then i'm sorry to tell you but your hard drive has failed - hardware defect.
This cannot be repaired, you will have to replace it .

Check the BIOS to see if the hard disk is detected,if not open the case and re-seat the data cable on the hard drive and alsowhere it connects to the motherboard disk controller.
If it still gives this error message and the BIOS does not detect this harddrive, then the hard drive is probably faulty.
A further check on the hard drive, remove the hard drive and connect it to anUSB hard drive adapter and connect it to a working computer's USB port, if thiscomputer does not detect it as an external storage device then the hard driveis faulty.
To get the computer operating again, install a new hard drive in your computerand then install Windows on this hard drive plus the computer's devicedrivers and your programs.

Hello Friend, after reading your problem i suggest you that first check your connection cable it may be corroded or stretched try new cable this may be solve your problem.
If still you got same problem then go to manufacturer for solving this because this may be internal problem like your hard drive lens is not working or the driver card may gone this is done sometime because of attaching or removing hard drive unsafely like just plug in and out do not use safety remove option. So go to manufacturer of hard drive if it is in warranty then they may repair or even replace it.
Hope this will solve your problem.Best of Luck...

am not so sure if this is a similar issue with iomega external drive in which the drive wont show up on My Computer but when the external drive was plugged into an ubuntu machine the drive was being detected and working just fine.

Please try to do the same. plug your external drive to an ubuntu machine and lets see if it can be detected. If it is then the hard disk has a similar issue with iomega drives. check this link.

Assuming that the external hdd is physically working fine, everything is pointing to a damaged boot sector.

You can get back most (if not all) your data stored in your external drive with the help of an application called: Pc Inspector File recovery.
Its a freeware.
Here is the link: http://pcinspector.de/Sites/file_recovery/download.htm?language=1#

Simply install it on your C:\ drive, and follow the prompts.
Please let us know the outcome.

Don't forget to rate this answer if it helps

First, try connecting the external drive to another computer. If the second computer fails to detect it, chances are that the housing or, the drive inside have failed. Determining this requires a basic knowledge of external drives. If however the drive is rckognized the the second computer, turn off the first computer and strt it up again (not restart). Then plug your external drive to a usb port directly (not to a hub) and, it should be detected.

If the computer cannot Bootup with an error message that hard drive nor detected or no boot device then you could have a faulty hard disk.
Go into the BIOS configuration and see if the BIOS detects the hard disk. If it is not detected then it is probably faulty.
Next reset the ATA data cable on the hard drive and at the motherboard. Bootup the computer again, also check the BIOS configuration again to see if it detects the hard drive.
If it still does not find the hard drive then remove the hard drive and connect it to an USB hard drive adapter and plug it into a working computer's USB port. If this computer does not detect it as an external hard drive then this proves the hard drive is faulty.
To get your computer working again, replace the hard drive and install Windows together with the device drivers and your programs.

If the laptop cannot detect the hard drive. This can be caused by a faulty disk controller, or a faulty disk drive.

1st. Reseat the hard drive and see if the laptop boots up.

2nd. Go into the BIOS configuration and see if the BIOS detects the hard drive.

3rd. If the BIOS can't detect the hard disk, the remove the hard drive and connect it to an USB hard drive adapter and plug it into a working computer's USB port. If this computer detects this drive as an external disk drive and you can see the contents of the hard drive, then the hard drive is OK and the fault is in the laptop.

4th. If the hard drive cannot be detected then the hard drive is faulty, you need to replace the faulty hard drive in your laptop and install Windows to get an operating laptop again.