Hard Drive Will Not Mount

1. Mount Hard Drive Mac
2. Mac Os Hard Drive Will Not Mount

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If you can see the hard drive in Disk Utility check underneath it for a volume. If it is there click on it and select Mount. If your Mac has already mounted the drive the option Unmount will be. Hi, I was thinking more of how to mount it so that windows 7/2008 actually sees it as a physical drive and not a network mapped drive. I don't know if I actually make sense. However there are some software out there that does not see mapped drive as a physical drive (e.g Computer management Start-Run-compmgmt.msc)? Thanks – jwee Feb 2 '10.

Most of the time, when you connect an external hard drive to your Mac's USB port, you soon see it mount on the desktop. Apple likes to ensure these are easy to find, so they also appear in the Finder in the left-hand column under Devices, since Mac's treat them the same way as another computer.

However, sometimes, an external hard drive doesn't show up. It's annoying, especially when you need to transfer something right then. And besides, there can be a risk that data on the external USB pen, hard, or flash drive is corrupt, which means you can't transfer what you need between devices at all.

Corrupt data can be one reason your Mac won't recognize an external drive, but there are other reasons too. Let's take a look why this is happening and how you can get an external drive to appear on your Mac and get recover data to access to your documents.

How to fix an external disk drive that won't show up on a Mac

Why an external disk drive is not showing up? There could be a few reasons why a USB flash drive isn't making an appearance.

Open an External Drive Not Showing on Mac

Get a huge set of top utilities for troubleshooting external hard drives not mounting on a Mac

Start with the basics:

1. Check whether the drive is properly plugged in. It sounds obvious, but since this relies on a wire - either a USB cable or HDMI cable - if it's not connected properly then it won't appear on your desktop.
2. Faulty cable. Assuming it's plugged in correctly, not wobbly or loose, the cable could be at fault. Try connecting the same device with a different cable.
3. Damaged USB or flash drive port. It could be a hardware issue with the Mac. If you've got another port, try connecting the device to that one.
4. Reboot your Mac. Sometimes, if a USB disk won't boot, the cause is macOS issue. Hopefully, some data damage that can be fixed by restarting. Choose the Apple menu > Restart. Or press and hold the power button and, when a dialog box appears, click the Restart or press R. Restarting your Mac essentially clears your macOS's memory and starts it up fresh.
5. Incorrectly formatted drive. Not every external drive is optimized for Macs. It could be that you are trying to connect something only fit to interact with Windows devices. If you've got a PC or laptop, it's worth connecting and seeing if you can access the files through another device. The best way to look for an incorrectly formatted drive is to go to
   Apple (in the top toolbar menu) > About This Mac > Storage.
   See if the external drive shows up here. For more information, go to the same menu option, then select System Report.
6. Mac not formatted to display external drives on the desktop. It could be that your Mac already recognizes the device, but just isn't showing its icon on the desktop screen. Even if that is the case, the drive will still appear in the left-hand column of the Finder menu under Devices. You should be able to access your drive that way, and, in the Finder menu under Preferences > General, you can check External Drives to ensure that from now on it shows up on your desktop too.
7. Reset NVRAM. To do this, shut down or restart your Mac, switch it back on and immediately press these four keys together for at least 20 seconds: Option, Command, P, and R. It should look as though your Mac has started again; if it has, release the keys when you hear the second startup chime. Hopefully, the hard drive has shown up now.
8. Check Apple's Disk Utility to see if an external drive is showing up. Disk Utility is within System Preferences, or you can find it using Spotlight. If it is visible, then click the option to Mount, which should make it visible on the desktop and in the External Drives option in the Finder menu.

Unfortunately, if none of those options has worked and the external drive still isn't visible, then it could have crashed, or be well and truly broken. But there might still be a way you can recover the data on the external drive.

How to show connected devices in Finder

1. Go to the Finder menu and select Preferences (Cmd+comma).
2. From General tab tick External disks to ensure that from now on it shows on the desktop.

Mount Hard Drive Mac

In the Sidebar tab you can choose which folders and devices will be shown in the left-hand column of the Finder window.

How to add cloud storages to Finder

You can also mount cloud storage as local drive on your Mac. By connecting Google Drive, Dropbox, or Amazon to your computer, you get more space for securely accessing and sharing files. For your ease, add cloud drives to Finder with CloudMounter app, so that you keep them close at hand. You can read detailed instructions on managing cloud storage as local drives here.

Repair the failed external drives with First Aid

If your drive is having problems, you can try to fix them yourself with First Aid and therefore get access to your files. First Aid tool will check the disk for errors and then attempt a repair as needed. It helps to verify and repair a range of issues related to startup HD and external drive problems. If you are able to fix the hard drive or SSD in your Mac (or an external drive) using Disk Utility you will hopefully be able to recover your files.

To run Fist Aid on an external hard drive:

1. Open Disk Utility. You can searching for it using Spotlight Search or via Finder > Application > Utility
2. Check on your external hard drive, click the First Aid tab and select Run to start running diagnostics.

If First Aid successful in fixing errors, the external drive should be available to mount. If the utility unable to repair issues, your drive truly is broken or formatted using a file system that the Mac cannot read - in this way we suggest you follow the next steps to recover data from a damaged disk drive.

How to recover data from a crashed drive

Thankfully, there is an app for that. Disk Drill is the world's premier data recovery software for Mac OS X. Powerful enough to retrieve long-lost, mistakenly deleted files from Macs, external hard drives and USB drives and camera cards.

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An easy way to recover lost files on an external hard drive

Providing you already have Disk Drill Pro version, which you can get automatically by downloading from Setapp:

1. Connect your drive to the Mac.
2. Quit all other applications on the Mac, especially those that may be trying to access the external drive (e.g. iPhoto, Words)
3. Launch Disk Drill.
4. Click on the external drive that you are trying to recover files from. If it has partitions, you will see all of them. If, however, you still don't see any volume to the external drive then you may need to try some of the steps above again or read the Disk Drill Scanning FAQs.
5. To avoid the external drive being accessed during the recovery process, click Extras next to the drive or drive partition or file, then select Remount Volume As Read Only. A padlock will appear, protecting the drive during the process.
6. Now click Rebuild (or Recover) next to the file(s) you are trying to recover. Once the scan is finished - it may take some time if the files are large - a list of files will appeal.
7. Next, click Mount Found Items as Disk button on the bottom-left below the scan results.
8. Disk Drill 'strongly suggest saving the files to a different drive than the one you are trying to recover files from. Saving to the same drive substantially lowers your chances of recovery.'
9. A drive icon will appear, which once you double click will give you the option to open the files as you would do before they were lost. Drag them to another location, such as your desktop or a folder on your Mac.
10. Open the files to ensure they have been recovered properly and safely eject the external drive.

Disk Drill does have other ways to recover lost files but assuming there aren't complications, this method is the most effective. Disk Drill Pro recovery app is available from Setapp, along with dozens of Mac apps that will make your life easier. Never have to worry about a crashed or corrupted external drive again.

A few more tips on getting your files back

1. Macs and third-party apps that look after Macs, such as Disk Drill and iStat Menus come with a S.M.A.R.T. (also known as Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) status monitor. If a SMART check reports errors, then it could mean the hard drive is at risk of failing completely. Within Disk Utility and Disk Drill, there are several solutions for this: Repair Disk Permissions and Repair Disk. If neither work, it's recommended that you backup all of the data from the disk, erase, then run a SMART check again. The external hard drive should show up as Verified.
2. Partitions can get lost within hard drives, temporarily hiding all of the information contained within. Disk Drill can help to identify and restore this information.
3. Within Disk Drill, you can restore data when a hard drive is damaged or add formatting, which is also something Disk Utility can help with.
4. CleanMyMac, another useful app available from Setapp, can help you identify external hard drive errors and repair them. It is an essential tool worth trying when you're having external hard drive difficulties.

Try all these apps for free

Get a huge set of top apps for keeping your Mac in shape. Best utilities in one pack, give it a go!

Alternative ways to recover data from an external hard drive

Reset the System Management Controller (SMC) if your Mac shuts down when you plug in an external hard drive. Then use a different port to connect the external hard drive. If you've got a battery that you can't remove:

• Shut down and unplug the power adapter
• Press Shift-Control-Option and the power button at the same time. Do this for 10 seconds
• Release all keys
• Plug the power adapter back in and switch your Mac back on

For Macs with removable batteries, you need to switch them off, remove the battery, then press and hold the power button for 5 seconds. After that, put the battery back in, plug in the power adapter and switch the power on again.

What's your file format? One reason your Mac isn't recognizing the hard drive is the file format. Windows uses NTFS file formats, while Macs, up until the introduction of Sierra, have used HFS+. Now, Apple has introduced the Apple File System (APFS) for newer operating systems. It is possible to format a hard drive so it can be read on Mac and Windows computers, providing you format using exFAT. However, if you're having problems accessing the files and the issue is due to formatting, you will need to connect it to a device it can be read on, and then format the files correctly for the computer you are going to use it on next.

How to make Ext2/Ext3 drives readable on Mac

The common issue is Ext2- and Ext3-formatted drives are not readable on macOS. There are two ways to access such external drives on your Mac – via Linux OS or FUSE system. The easiest would be installing Linux to a secondary drive or virtual machine.

If you go with Linux installation, dual boot your Mac with Linux on another drive and use FAT32 as a transfer intermediary. If you don't have a drive to install Linux to, use virtual machine as an interface for it. Transferring can be done the same way – with FAT32, or via network.

Another option for reading Ext2/Ext3 disks is mounting disk with Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE). Basically, it works as an extra interface enabling file system access via specially installed modules. Here's how to mount drives with FUSE:

1. Install FUSE for macOS or MacFUSE as well as fuse-ext2 module.
2. Use the following Terminal command to enable Disk Utility's debug menu and see all partitions: defaults write com.apple.DiskUtility DUDebugMenuEnabled 1
3. Attach your Ext2/Ext3 drive and locate the device name via Disk Utility.
4. In your user account, create a folder to be used as a mount point.
5. Use the following Terminal command to mount the drive as read-only: fuse-ext2 /dev/disk2s2 /Volumes/mountpoint
6. For write support, use the command: fuse-ext2 -o force /dev/disk2s2 /Volumes/mountpoint

And that's not the only case where Terminal helps you access external drive.

Employ the handy all-powerful Terminal, which always comes forward with solutions for difficult problems. Especially if System Information does recognize the USB or hard drive, but continues to hide it from you, disconnect the drive and try to find it using the Terminal, which you can find in Applications > Utilities.

• Once in the Terminal, type in the command diskutil list
• A list with information about volumes and drives should appear
• Look for a section labelled /dev/disk_ (external, physical)
• Make a note of the whole line after the word disk
• Now put the following command into the Terminal diskutil info disk followed by the number or digits assigned to that disk
• Now you should see detailed information about the drive, therefore confirming that your Mac can and does recognize it
• Eject using the Terminal by entering the command diskutil eject disk followed by the number or digits assigned to that disk
• Physically remove the disk from you Mac
• Plug it back in and your Mac should recognize it

Console is also reliable when it comes to solving tricky problems, although it isn't always that easy to use. You can find Console under Applications > Utilities > Console. Console shows if an external drive or any error is detected under the Errors and Faults tab. If no errors show up, then the problem is not caused by the device.

To sum up, there are lots of potential solutions for a Mac not reading an external hard drive. If we were to pick one, Disk Drill seems to be the most well-rounded, offering plenty of customizations and power in an easy-to-use interface. Disk Drill Pro recovery app is available via Setapp, along with 150+ Mac apps that strive to make your life much much easier. At the very least, you'll never have to worry about a crashed or corrupted external drive ever again.

Meantime, prepare for all the awesome things you can do with Setapp.

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Summary: When plugging your Seagate Backup Plus into a Mac computer, you may find the drive stops working and is not mounting in Disk Utility. Have you been troubled by the issue? This post will give you 7 workable solutions to fix Seagate Backup Plus drive not mounting/working issue on Mac.

Seagate Backup Plus external hard drive is often used for Time Machine backup. But many users reported that they were unable to mount Seagate Backup Plus drive on Mac computers. And some say their Seagate Backup Plus couldn't work on Mac after plugged in.

Here is a real example:

'I really need your help. My Seagate Backup plus just stopped getting detected (led not working anymore) with my MacBook Pro 2016 model (with USB Type C to USB 3 connector) suddenly. Www premiere com. It was working fine 1 month before. I tried this backup disk with a Windows computer and the LED light is working in that case but I am not able to get it to work with my MacBook Pro anymore. Any idea guys?' Adobe animate 2020 getintopc.

In fact, this issue is very common, especially for those who frequently share the same drive between different computers. This page will help when Seagate Backup Plus drive doesn't work on Mac.

7 solutions to Seagate Backup Plus not mounting/working on Mac

For some reason, Seagate external hard drives could not be recognized by Mac. If you can't mount the Seagate Backup Plus drive in Disk Utility, the hard drive won't work on Mac. And you can't access the data stored on it. So it's very urgent to fix the problem to make it work again.

Here are solutions to the Seagate Backup Plus not working or mounting issue.

• 1. Basic checks like the USB cable, USB port, and power resource.
• 2. Check whether the Seagate Backup Plus is showing up in Disk Utility
• 3. Check if the Seagate Backup Plus drive is mounted in Disk Utility
• 4. Show the Seagate Backup Plus on the desktop
• 5. Repair Seagate Backup Plus drive via First Aid
• 6. Update the software on Mac
• 7. Fix the not mounting or working Seagate Backup Plus drive by reformatting

1. Have some basic checks

Sometimes, the Seagate Backup Plus drive won't mount on Mac is due to the bad USB port or cable. Thus, once the Seagate Backup Plus drive stops working, you can first do some routine checks as below.

• Step 1. Check if the cable of the Seagate Backup Plus drive is connected properly to your Mac
  If the drive isn't properly plugged in, it will fail to mount as it received not enough or even no power.
• Step 2. Make sure the USB cable is not at fault
  Try using a different USB cable to see if that fixes the problem.
• Step 3. Check if the USB port is damaged
  Plug the Seagate Backup Plus into another USB port if you have another one. Otherwise, insert another external storage device in this USB port.
• Step 4. Check whether the Seagate Backup Plus external hard drive is powered properly
  In general, the current of USB port 2.3 and 3.0 are enough for the most external portable hard drives. But sometimes this amount of current may be insufficient while the drive is spinning up.
• In this situation, you can try to connect the Seagate Backup Plus with a USB Y cable if you have one. And for Seagate Backup Plus Hub and Expansion Desktop, a power adaptor is required for power supply.
• Step 5. Access the drive on other Macs
  Connect the Seagate Backup Plus drive to another Mac computer to see whether it works on that one or not. If the drive works on another Mac computer, there is something wrong with your Mac computer rather than the drive. What you should do is to ask for help from Apple support.
• Step 6. Check if the format of Seagate hard drive is supported by macOS
  For example, a Windows BitLocker encrypted drive will not be working on Mac originally. Your Mac computer is not able to mount it. To fix the problem, you can plug the Seagate Backup Plus into a PC and then access the drive on Windows.

2. Check whether the Seagate Backup Plus is showing up in Disk Utility

To troubleshoot this problem, you first need to know if this Seagate hard drive is detected by your Mac. Open the Utilities folder in your Applications folder. Launch Disk Utility and check the left pane then. If you can't see the external hard drive in macOS, the drive probably has been physically damaged. In that case, you should send the drive to the local repair shop. Otherwise, you can move to the next solution.

Mac Os Hard Drive Will Not Mount

3. Check if the Seagate Backup Plus drive is mounted in Disk Utility

If the Seagate Backup Plus is mounted in Disk Utility, you should blame the wrong computer settings or outdated computer. Fortunately, it's easy to fix these issues. Just try solution 4 and solution 5. If the external hard drive is greyed out in Disk Utility, it's not mounted. You can try right-clicking the Seagate Backup Plus and choose the 'Mount' button. If that doesn't work, the drive has some file system problems. Please follow the solution 6 to repair the problem.

4. Show the Seagate Backup Plus on the desktop

If the Seagate external hard drive is mounted in Disk Utility, but it still doesn't show up on Mac. First of all, you should make sure the settings in Finder display drive icons on the desktop.

• 1. Go to Finder > Preferences > General tab.
• 2. Select 'External disks' under 'Show these items on the desktop' and then the connected external hard drive will appear on the desktop.

5. Repair Seagate Backup Plus drive via First Aid

Seagate Backup Plus not mounting issue on Mac can be caused by file system problems. Disk Utility's First Aid is a built-in tool on Mac to deal with errors related to disks, such as file system corruption. Pirated version of microsoft office. So you can try to fix the unmountable/corrupted Seagate Backup Plus external hard drive in Disk Utility by following the steps below.

• 1. Go to Utilities Disk Utility.
• 2. Click 'View' in the top menu bar (Or click 'View' on the top window). Then select 'Show All Devices'.
• 3. Select the Seagate Backup Plus external hard drive from the left sidebar.
• 4. Click 'First Aid' on the top of the Disk Utility window.
• 5. Click 'Run' to perform hard disk diagnostics and fix the not mounting/not working Seagate Backup Plus.

6. Update the software on Mac

Software updates keep your computer and programs secure, deal with quite a few bugs, and provide new features. Out-of-date software can cause a variety of issues. It's possible that the operating system will become sluggish and the connected device may not function properly. Fortunately, you can easily update the software on Mac.

Case 1. Update the software on macOS Mojave or Catalina. If you upgrade to macOS Mojave or macOS Catalina, you should choose 'System Preferences' from the Apple menu, then click 'Software Update' to check for updates. If any updates are available, click 'Update Now' to install them.

Case 2. Update the software on earlier macOS versions. Just launch the Mac App Store, click the 'Update' tab on the top and then choose the 'Update All'.

7. Fix the not mounting or working Seagate Backup Plus drive by reformatting

If First Aid failed on the external hard drive, it might have some serious errors that are beyond its reparation capability. In that case, you need to recover lost data from the Seagate Backup Plus external hard drive as soon as possible.

Step 1. Recover lost data from the unmountable/corrupted Seagate Back Plus

iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is free external hard drive data recovery software. It can easily recover files when the hard drive is not working or mounting on Mac. Also, it canrecover deleted photos and lost data from formatted drives, unreadable drives, corrupted drives, and recover deleted/lost partitions, etc. It's compatible withmacOS Big Sur 11/10.15/10.14/10.13/10.12/10.11/10.10/10.9/10.8/10.7.

• 1. Download and install iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac on Mac.
• 2. Launch iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
• 3. Select the Seagate Backup Plus and click the 'Scan' button to scan for all lost data.
• 4. Preview the searching results, choose files you want to get back, and click the 'Recover' button.

Here is a short video tutorial which shows you how to recover lost data from unmountable/corrupted external hard drives:

Step 2: Reformat the Seagate Backup Plus to make it work

After recovering data from the unmounted Seagate Backup Plus, you can now go to Disk Utility and reformat it without worrying about data loss.

• Steps to reformat Seagate Backup Plus external hard drive

If unfortunately, you can't reformat the Seagate Backup Plus drive, it must have physical issues. In this case, you have to look for help from a local data recovery company.

Bonus Part: Introduction to different Seagate Backup Plus drives

You probably use a Seagate desktop drive like Backup Plus Hub and Expansion. Or you could use a Backup Plus Portable drive like Ultra Touch and Slim. No matter which Seagate Backup Plus drive you choose, it could not work on the Mac for some reason.

Therefore, it's important to know the differences between those Seagate Backup Plus drives. This helps you to use the Seagate Backup Plus drive more correctly and efficiently, and then avoid hard disk corruption.

1. Seagate Backup Plus Hub: This Seagate Backup Plus Desktop drive has large capacities with cross-platform compatibility, which means you don't have to format the drive for both Mac and Windows again. It's an all-in-one data hub and recharging station for tablet, smartphone and camera.
2. Seagate Backup Plus Ultra Touch: Backup Plus Ultra Touch portable hard drives feature password protection and hardware encryption, USB-C compatibility, and file sync. You can't open the Seagate Backup Plus drive on Mac until it's unlocked. Moreover, an NTFS for Mac software is needed to use Backup Plus Ultra Touch on Mac, as it's preformatted with NTFS.
3. Seagate Backup Plus Slim: Seagate Backup Plus is small enough for a loaded laptop bag. It's an ideal external hard drive with easy portability and enough storage space. But avoid dropping your Seagate Backup Plus drive during transportation, in case it's damaged and not working.
4. SeagateBackup Plus Portable: Backup Plus portable drives offer easy-to-use software tools like Seagate Dashboard, so that you can schedule automatic backup and mirror folders easily.

How to Fix Samsung External SSD Not Working on Apple Silicon M1 Mac?

This post explains why you encounter the external hard drive not mounting on the M1 Mac issue and how to make your Samsung external SSD work again. Read more >>

Conclusion

No matter what caused Seagate Backup Plus not mounting, working, or readable issue on Mac, such as logical problems and physical damages, the most important thing is to back up important data or recover lost data with free Mac data recovery software. iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is a powerful and reliable data recovery tool on macOS which supports various external drives, including external hard drives, SD cards, USB flash drives, etc.

If you have any suggestions to solve this issue or experience any questions when using iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac, please feel free to let us know.