- For Desktop external hard drives like Seagate Backup plus and WD Elements Desktop, make sure the external hard drive is externally connected to a power socket. For portable USB external hard drives, make sure the USB port is not wobbly, dusty, loose, or deformed.
- Maybe you just picked up a new external hard drive, DVD or CD device, server, or even memory stick to use with your Mac. Being able to see these external devices and their contents is obviously important. And the most convenient place to access them is in the Finder Sidebar. This short tutorial walks you through how to show external drives on.
What to do if Your External Hard Drive is Invisible on Desktop, or in Finder or in Disk Utility?
Most of time, the Mac operating system will automatically recognize and mount the attached disks on desktop, in Finder and in Disk Utility for your easy access.
Download the free-to-try Mac data recovery software to recover your lost data from external hard drive on Mac. 'Hi friends, when I connected my 2 TB Seagate external hard drive after a long time on my MacBook Air (running on macOS Catalina), the drive did not show up in Desktop or Finder sidebar. This drive has all my important digital memories. If the box is checked, move on to fix external hard drive not showing up on Mac. Mount the Drive in Finder If you think the drive works fine, let us see if we can manually attach it to MacOS. As you can see, not a single icon is displayed on the Mac OS X desktop. To display hard disks icons on the desktop, follow the below steps: Launch Finder from the Dock; Using the Menu bar, click on Finder then click on Preferences.
However, if you can't see your drive on Mac in one of those places, it doesn't necessarily mean that your drive is corrupted, resulting in it unrecognizable and unmountable. Iterm 3 2 8.
There are ways to make your removable disk like external hard drives show up again.
How to show the external hard drive on desktop
Many people want to keep their Mac's desktop very organized and tidy, so they don't like leaving too many icons, documents, pictures or other files on the desktop at all. If you are connecting your external hard drive to a such Mac, the icon of the external hard drive is hidden.
It is easy to make the icon of the external hard drive show up on the desktop again:
- Click on the 'Finder' at the top menu bar.
- Choose 'Preferences…'.
- Click on 'General' tab.
- Tick the 'External disk' under 'Show these items on the desktop'.
After the external hard drive's icon shows up on the desktop, you can open it and access the files directly from there.
How to show the external hard drive in Finder
Mac's Finder is a built-in file management tool and a graphic user interface where you can launch applications and manage files on internal/external disks and network volumes.
Many times, it is also possible that you can see the connected external hard drive is on the desktop but not in the Finder. Disabling the external disk's showing up on the desktop and in the Finder could be a good way to hide the drive from unauthorized users.
The steps to change the setting is very similar to the ones above:
- Click on the 'Finder' at the top menu bar.
- Choose 'Preferences…'.
- Click on 'Sidebar' tab.
- Tick the 'External disk' under 'Devices'.
Then all connected portable drives will be listed in the left sidebar of the Finder. You can easily access the disk and the files on it from there as well.
How to show the external hard drive in Disk Utility
Mac's Disk Utility is a built-in disk management tool with which you can open, mount, unmount, eject, repair, format, partition, rename, and recover the detected volumes.
It is relatively rare that your disk disappears in Disk Utility. It may result from the way how you make the Disk Utility show the disks, in Volumes or in Disks.
Try the following steps:
- Open Disk Utility by going through Finder, Applications and Disk Utility.
- Click on 'Show' at the top menu bar where the Apple logo is.
- Choose 'Show All Devices'.
How to install starcraft 2 maps. You should be able see the names of your connected external hard disks in the left column now.
If, unfortunately, you don't either see the volumes nor the disks in the Disk Utility. There might be some disk corruption or connection problem.
Do the following steps to make your Mac at least detect the external hard drive:
- Restart the Mac computer.
- Verify the good connection between the Mac and the external hard drive using a reliable cable and USB port.
- Reset NVRAM.
If the disk is still invisible on Mac's Disk Utility, the external hard drive is possibly physically damaged and needs to be replaced.
What if the external hard drive is greyed-out in Disk Utility?
Well, a greyed-out, also an unmounted, external disk will cause the disk not showing up on the desktop and in the Finder.
Did you try to mount the external hard drive in Disk Utility by yourself? Did you use First Aid to repair the disk? If both of them can't fix the problem, your external hard drive is probably seriously corrupted.
Access Hard Drive On Mac
If you are worried about the important pictures, documents, videos and other files on the external hard disk, you will need the help of professional data recovery software that work on the Mac platform.
How to cut and paste an image on a mac. Will it be complicated to use data recovery software to save files from the external hard drive? If you are using a commercial data recovery program, usually it is very easy to use and has a trustworthy support team to help with any issues you may encounter during data recovery process.
Here we are using iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac to show you how to recover files from the unmounted external hard drive.
- Free download, install and launch the iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
- Keep the external hard drive connected and choose it from the software's drive list.
- Check 'Deep scan' and click on 'Scan' button.
Disclaimer: Super fast external hard drive mac. the deep scanning may take hours to finish especially when the external hard drive has a large capacity and a great mount of data. So make sure your computer is connected to power in case any sudden shutdown will interrupt the scanning.
- Preview the results to know if the wanted files are recoverable.
- Select the files and click on 'Recover' button to save them to another healthy disk.
Web video player for mac. If you have backed up the files or don't care about the data, you can directly format the drive on Mac to make the drive work again.
External Hard Drive For Mac
- Open the Disk Utility.
- Select the greyed-out external hard drive and click on 'Erase'.
- Fill in the name and choose desired file system and scheme.
- Click on 'Erase' button.
Formatting is a process to prepare a storage device to be used by the operating system for restoring data. The process will delete all files on the device and set up a new file system. It means that the bad sectors will be marked and damaged files will be deleted too. As a result, formatting can solve almost all logical problem on a disk and the disk will be usable again.
Bonus tips
In regard to the precautions to protect the external hard drive from corruption and protect the data from losing, we have a few tips here:
- Eject the external hard drive safely.
- Detach the external hard drive during restarting the computer.
- Back up important files as often as possible.
- Do not drop the external hard drive hard nor set it in a corrosive or damp environment.
Verdict
What to do if Your External Hard Drive is Invisible on Desktop, or in Finder or in Disk Utility?
Most of time, the Mac operating system will automatically recognize and mount the attached disks on desktop, in Finder and in Disk Utility for your easy access.
Download the free-to-try Mac data recovery software to recover your lost data from external hard drive on Mac. 'Hi friends, when I connected my 2 TB Seagate external hard drive after a long time on my MacBook Air (running on macOS Catalina), the drive did not show up in Desktop or Finder sidebar. This drive has all my important digital memories. If the box is checked, move on to fix external hard drive not showing up on Mac. Mount the Drive in Finder If you think the drive works fine, let us see if we can manually attach it to MacOS. As you can see, not a single icon is displayed on the Mac OS X desktop. To display hard disks icons on the desktop, follow the below steps: Launch Finder from the Dock; Using the Menu bar, click on Finder then click on Preferences.
However, if you can't see your drive on Mac in one of those places, it doesn't necessarily mean that your drive is corrupted, resulting in it unrecognizable and unmountable. Iterm 3 2 8.
There are ways to make your removable disk like external hard drives show up again.
How to show the external hard drive on desktop
Many people want to keep their Mac's desktop very organized and tidy, so they don't like leaving too many icons, documents, pictures or other files on the desktop at all. If you are connecting your external hard drive to a such Mac, the icon of the external hard drive is hidden.
It is easy to make the icon of the external hard drive show up on the desktop again:
- Click on the 'Finder' at the top menu bar.
- Choose 'Preferences…'.
- Click on 'General' tab.
- Tick the 'External disk' under 'Show these items on the desktop'.
After the external hard drive's icon shows up on the desktop, you can open it and access the files directly from there.
How to show the external hard drive in Finder
Mac's Finder is a built-in file management tool and a graphic user interface where you can launch applications and manage files on internal/external disks and network volumes.
Many times, it is also possible that you can see the connected external hard drive is on the desktop but not in the Finder. Disabling the external disk's showing up on the desktop and in the Finder could be a good way to hide the drive from unauthorized users.
The steps to change the setting is very similar to the ones above:
- Click on the 'Finder' at the top menu bar.
- Choose 'Preferences…'.
- Click on 'Sidebar' tab.
- Tick the 'External disk' under 'Devices'.
Then all connected portable drives will be listed in the left sidebar of the Finder. You can easily access the disk and the files on it from there as well.
How to show the external hard drive in Disk Utility
Mac's Disk Utility is a built-in disk management tool with which you can open, mount, unmount, eject, repair, format, partition, rename, and recover the detected volumes.
It is relatively rare that your disk disappears in Disk Utility. It may result from the way how you make the Disk Utility show the disks, in Volumes or in Disks.
Try the following steps:
- Open Disk Utility by going through Finder, Applications and Disk Utility.
- Click on 'Show' at the top menu bar where the Apple logo is.
- Choose 'Show All Devices'.
How to install starcraft 2 maps. You should be able see the names of your connected external hard disks in the left column now.
If, unfortunately, you don't either see the volumes nor the disks in the Disk Utility. There might be some disk corruption or connection problem.
Do the following steps to make your Mac at least detect the external hard drive:
- Restart the Mac computer.
- Verify the good connection between the Mac and the external hard drive using a reliable cable and USB port.
- Reset NVRAM.
If the disk is still invisible on Mac's Disk Utility, the external hard drive is possibly physically damaged and needs to be replaced.
What if the external hard drive is greyed-out in Disk Utility?
Well, a greyed-out, also an unmounted, external disk will cause the disk not showing up on the desktop and in the Finder.
Did you try to mount the external hard drive in Disk Utility by yourself? Did you use First Aid to repair the disk? If both of them can't fix the problem, your external hard drive is probably seriously corrupted.
Access Hard Drive On Mac
If you are worried about the important pictures, documents, videos and other files on the external hard disk, you will need the help of professional data recovery software that work on the Mac platform.
How to cut and paste an image on a mac. Will it be complicated to use data recovery software to save files from the external hard drive? If you are using a commercial data recovery program, usually it is very easy to use and has a trustworthy support team to help with any issues you may encounter during data recovery process.
Here we are using iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac to show you how to recover files from the unmounted external hard drive.
- Free download, install and launch the iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
- Keep the external hard drive connected and choose it from the software's drive list.
- Check 'Deep scan' and click on 'Scan' button.
Disclaimer: Super fast external hard drive mac. the deep scanning may take hours to finish especially when the external hard drive has a large capacity and a great mount of data. So make sure your computer is connected to power in case any sudden shutdown will interrupt the scanning.
- Preview the results to know if the wanted files are recoverable.
- Select the files and click on 'Recover' button to save them to another healthy disk.
Web video player for mac. If you have backed up the files or don't care about the data, you can directly format the drive on Mac to make the drive work again.
External Hard Drive For Mac
- Open the Disk Utility.
- Select the greyed-out external hard drive and click on 'Erase'.
- Fill in the name and choose desired file system and scheme.
- Click on 'Erase' button.
Formatting is a process to prepare a storage device to be used by the operating system for restoring data. The process will delete all files on the device and set up a new file system. It means that the bad sectors will be marked and damaged files will be deleted too. As a result, formatting can solve almost all logical problem on a disk and the disk will be usable again.
Bonus tips
In regard to the precautions to protect the external hard drive from corruption and protect the data from losing, we have a few tips here:
- Eject the external hard drive safely.
- Detach the external hard drive during restarting the computer.
- Back up important files as often as possible.
- Do not drop the external hard drive hard nor set it in a corrosive or damp environment.
Verdict
Show Mac Hard Drive Icon
Hopefully, your external hard disk has been visible on Mac by now. When you cannot see the connected external disks on Mac, don't be panic because it doesn't mean that your disk is damaged and all your files are gone.
