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Inability to Mount 3.5" Hard Drive in Docking Station

0388279

0388279

Cancelled
Original poster
Feb 27, 2014
344
85
Hi All,

I am having some difficulty with this one and hopefully someone can point me in the correct direction. I have 3.5" WD Red drive that I would like to access with a USB 3.0 hard drive docking station. I am unable to get the drive to mount nor does it show up in the disk utility. I have tried the following:
  • Confirmed the 3.5" drive is good.
  • Attempted two different brands of hard drive docking stations.
  • Used different USB cables
  • Tried three different macs (2014 MBA, 2016 MBP 2018 MacMini). All operating under 10.14.2.
  • Connected to hard drive docking station via USB and USBC/TB3/USBA adaptor
  • Reset the SMC and PRAM (2014MBA) and NVRAM (2016MBP)
  • Portable 2.5" hard drives/flash drives will mount.
Any thoughts what might be going on or what I can attempt next?

Thank you for your help in advance.

Donald Barar
 
A possibly obvious question but...
... did you use docking stations that provided their own power (via an ac "power block")?

Does the drive mount on Windows PC's ??

What did you do to "confirm the 3.5" drive is good" ??
 
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Reactions: chabig
HI F,

Answers to you questions:
  • Does the hard drive dock have it's own power supply? Yes, both models. Two from Sabrent and one "brown box" device purchased from Fry's Electronics.
  • Does the drive in the dock mount on a Windows PC operating under Windows 10? No.
  • How did I test the drives? I installed both drives in a Windows PC operating under Windows 10 and connected with the SATA and power connections. Both drives were visible and working in Disk Manager.
These were good questions and I am delighted that you asked. Some other information that might be helpful.
  • The docks work normally in a Windows XP PC.
  • I have 4 2TB WD Red drive in a TB3 cabinet and they work fine.
  • I have read reports were others are having difficulty mounting drives in these cabinets as well. Some have reported that Spotlight is the issue. I have tried these suggestions but have found them not be successful.
Any other thoughts would be helpful.

Don
 
Next question:
What FORMAT are the drives in?
(you should be able to find this out on the PC side of things)
 
HI F,

One of the drives is NTFS the other is yet to be formatted.

Don
 
dgbarar said:
HI F,

One of the drives is NTFS the other is yet to be formatted.

Don
Click to expand...
You might want to try the following program so that your various Macs can see the NTFS drive. Microsoft NTFS for Mac by Paragon Software. This program allows users to read and write to NTFS drive. http://paragon-software.com. There is a demo version available and if you have any newer Seagate drives you can download this program for free on the Seagate site.
 
All has been resolved. Thank you everyone for you help.

Don
 
Intermittent hardware issue. What had me fooled was that it was happening across two different, albeit inexpensive, enclosures. All was resolved with a more substantial product from OWC.

Don
 
OWC Drive Dock USB-C Dual Drive Bay Solution Mac / PC / USB 3.1 Gen 2 Part Number TCDRVDCK. USB 3.1 Gen 2 is overkill for use with a 3.5" drive. However, it is of a substantial build and appears to be more durable than the junk enclosures you can get on Amazon for $30 USD.

Don
 
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