# my external hard drive won't mount...HELP!!!



## billybald

Hi, i'm sure this has already been covered before but i've been looking everywhere on the internet for hours trying to solve my problem here.

i have a Western Digital 250GB external hard drive (WD 2500JB) and it has worked fine for about 2 years, i've copied several files to it and have been able to access them for a long time. now suddenly the hard drive won't mount when i plug the USB into my MacBook. it says that it can not be recognized and it won't mount in Disk Utility or let me repair it there either.

any suggestions on what i can do to get my hard drive to mount again? i need my files back badly!


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## sinclair_tm

Have you tried it on a different Mac yet? It could be that the drives went bad.


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## billybald

yeah my usb drives work fine, any other ideas?


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## sinclair_tm

Does that mean it mount on a different Mac, but not your Mac? Just because it makes noise and lights up doesn't mean the drive is good. Or are you saying that the USB ports on the Mac are good as other things that plug into them work just fine?


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## Spatcher

Have you put anything on it recently?

Is it a mac formatted hd? Cause if not have you tried it on another computer?


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## yuzz

Hi!
Any luck with this yet? I have exactly the same external hard drive and cannot get it mounted under 10.5.6 on my Mac Mini or 10.4.11 on my MacBook. The disk is FAT32 formatted and under Windows XP (sp3) it shows up and works 100%...


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## OM3GA

I had this problem before. what i recommend is to first make sure the drive is able to mount on another Mac. If this works than is probably your Mac. Go to *System Profiler *and click USB, check if the computer recognizes the device, if it doesn't than you can try resetting the *PRAM and SMC*. Another step that did worked for me was to *use the external drive with its own power source*, for some reason my macbook sometimes wont provide enough power to the drive. Hope this helps.:grin:


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## Nenebug

I have got the same problem, damn apple really needs to fix this!.
I have checked the system profiler and it picks up my hard disk as said, but i still cannot access it from devices??? is there any way around this?


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## sinclair_tm

Apple fix what? All ultra portable hard drives have this problem on all systems. If they don't get enough power, they do not work right. Also, please start a new thread, giving us what Mac you have with system specs, version of the OS, what hard drive you are trying to use, and if it ever worked, does it work on other PCs, do other drives work on your Mac, and so on.


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## Nenebug

I have got a 500G Lacie(around a year old) that has its own power supply. I have been using it perfectly on my imac since i bought it. I got a brand new macbook and it wont recognise it (so i assumed that it was an apple related problem) i plug in my 250G lacie(same model) in to the macbook and it works perfectly? So why does my macbook recognise the 250G but not the 500G if theyre exactly the same model?


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## sinclair_tm

Being that they are different sizes, then are not the same, even if the model is the same. Are there one or two drives in the 500? If it's two drives, and you used Disk Utility to do a RAID, then it will only work on the Mac that made the RAID, your iMac. Also, the chipset most likely could be different because of the larger drive, and cause issues. Have you plugged the 500 into any other computer at all?


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## Nenebug

Thanx man its all good, it works now!


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## Bdwadley

I am now having the same problem. I have a WD 500GB external. I am running a mac book pro 17in. In the disk utility it's telling me there is no mounting point. But it was just working a second ago. How do I manually set the mounting point to my internal HD?


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## sinclair_tm

You can't manually set mount points, as they are related to the hardware IDs. Have you unplugged the drive from the Mac, turned it off, and rebooted the Mac, then turn the drive back on, and then plug it into the Mac again?


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## Bdwadley

Yes, just did. The main problem here seems to be my SMART status. it says "not supported." But this drive was working fine, plugged in, operational, then it said devise removal, and then now it says the SMART status has changed and it won't mount.


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## sinclair_tm

SMART status isn't supported on external drives, or I should say, I have never seen an external drive that had it supported. It could be that the drive has gone bad, and the enclosure is designed to tell the computer when it has gone bad by sending a signal to the SMART system, but this is only a guess. Main thing is to plug it into another computer. If it doesn't work on that Mac too, then I'd say the drive is gone. If it does work, then back it up and try reformatting it.


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## boots705

I hope this thread is still active --
I also have a WD 250gb external drive -- I've been using it without issue on my Mac MDD running 10.4.11 for a couple of years. Recently it's gotten uncooperative. Sometimes it mounts on startup, more often not. If I restart a number of times, eventually it shows up. I realized it was a FAT32 drive -- I just reformatted the drive as MacOS Extended Journaled in DiskUtility, and it checks out fine, but it's still inconsistent.
No problem with any of my other externals... WD or otherwise.
Is the problem with the drive or is there something else I should check?
Thank you!
--boots


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## sinclair_tm

Sounds like the enclosure may be going bad. Does it have the same issues with other computers?


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## boots705

I haven't tried it, but it sounds like that's my next step... I'll try that and check back in. Thanks!

For the record, today it only took 1 restart...


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## tim_wave

In the terminal type 
diskutil list

Then you drive icon should appear (e.i. Lacie 500gb).

If it doesn't appear, you can try to mount it manually.
So in the terminal type

diskutil mount /dev/disk1 

or the if the number is not 1, change it to whatever number it is in the listing from the first command.
:grin:


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## sinclair_tm

Please refrain from posting in year old threads!


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## IamAdReNaLin

tim_wave said:


> In the terminal type
> diskutil list
> 
> Then you drive icon should appear (e.i. Lacie 500gb).
> 
> If it doesn't appear, you can try to mount it manually.
> So in the terminal type
> 
> diskutil mount /dev/disk1
> 
> or the if the number is not 1, change it to whatever number it is in the listing from the first command.
> :grin:


I tried this but my disk timed out in the process of the mounting. I know my disk isn't gone because it still shows up in disk utility. Can anyone offer more help??? http://www.techsupportforum.com/images/smilies/1-sigh.gif


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## sinclair_tm

Please start your own thread, giving detailed information on your Mac, and the issue you are having, as well as the steps you have taken already.


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