Help with my new external hard drive

[jkramb]

I just got a western digital passport drive and when i plug it in it does not show on the desktop. when i go to the disk utility it shows up on the side column, but when i try to partition it, it tells me there is an input/output error. Does anyone know what this means and how to fix it?

[hughvane]

From Disk Utility, get Info on the drive and post back, then we can help further.

[jkramb]

From Disk Utility, get Info on the drive and post back, then we can help further.
this is the info it shows at the bottom. the weird thing is, it isn't a 2 TB hard drive, it's only 500gb. i hope this is the info you meant, when I right click the drive it doesn't give me any other info.

Disk Description : WD Media Total Capacity : 2 TB (2,199,023,255,552 Bytes)
Connection Bus : USB Write Status : Read/Write
Connection Type : External S.M.A.R.T. Status : Not Supported
USB Serial Number : 202020202020202020202020 Partition Map Scheme : Unformatted

[Horst]

Did you try and format the whole drive first ?

Disk utility - delete (MacOS Extended Journaled).
When making the partition, make sure to check GUID in options (button in partition window) .