external hard DISKS not detected

[Ashwink]

I recently encountered a problem in recognising external hard disks of any company. But the usb recognises pen drivers mouse, card readers etc....can anyone help me pls.

I am using HP pavilion G6 2005ax win7 ultimate.

[Cloud_Strider]

Are they external HDDs from the factory or are they normal HDDs placed inside an enclosure?

What does disk management look like with the USB external HDDs connected?

Go to Start, search for disk management, and open this result.
There should be a test representation of what drives are connected and a graphical representation. If possible, please post a screenshot of the graphical representation in disk management.

[Ashwink]

It is external hard disk,not an internal one.

I could see it showing in disk management but couldn't find in windows explorer(my computer)....

what is the solution...

it happens to all external harddisks i try....but could see it getting detected in other laptops.

[Cloud_Strider]

If you could, post a screenshot of disk management.

If you right-click the external drive in disk management, what options do you get? Is there any option related to the drive letter? If so, select it and see if you can assign it a drive letter.

[Ashwink]

I could see it available in disk management, and could assign the path for it also.

But my question is, should i assign the drive path everytime i connect a external hard disk.

The pic is just below.....

[Cloud_Strider]

To clarify, what happens if you manually assign a driver letter to Disk 1 in disk management?  One of two things will happen:  it will assign the driver letter and remember it for this drive (provided something else doesn't sue the driver letter as well) or it will give an error message providing more insight into the issue.  If the system is working properly, you should only need to assign a driver letter once (in reality, it should happen automatically). 

I suspect that the system will give an error message when trying to manually assign a driver letter since it is not doing this automatically.

[Ashwink]

i didn't get neither of the two.

There is no problem while removing the hard disk after assigning the path and inserting it again. What is it is i hav to give the drive path again if i have shutdowned the system and tried again.

[Cloud_Strider · Accepted solution]

If it is not giving an error message but it is letting you manually assign a drive letter, then the automount may be disabled (enabled by default).  See jeffsrawr's answer in this thread to enable/disable automount.

[Ashwink]

Thanks for that link. It worked and got no problem now

[Cloud_Strider]

You are most welcome.  I'm glad it is now working for you.

Thanks for updating the community.  🙂