MacBook will not mount or recognise External Hard drive.

[joeocal]

I have a 2.4 Ghz MacBook that i bought last summer, and a 250 GB Western Digital external hard drive (powered by computer) that i also bought last summer.

My problem is that My computer will not recognize the hard drive at all. it doesn't show up anywhere, and after attempting to reconnect it over and over, it will eventually pop up, and then disappear, saying that it was improperly ejected.

when i plug it into another computer, it works just fine (for the most part), leading me to believe that it is an issue with my computer and not the HD.

I tried resetting the PRAM as well as the SMC, to no avail.

any advice?

thanks.

 

[BlueRevolution]

It's a USB drive, I assume? Have you tried another port?

What do you mean by "for the most part"?

 

[Tomorrow]

Does this USB drive require an external power source? If so, and you're plugging it in only to the USB port, the power getting to it might not be enough.

 

[tripletaker]

It does sound like it's not getting enough power.

Open up Disk Utility (in the Utilities folder of Applications) and connect your drive. Does it show up on the left pane? If it does, click on it and see what the information on the bottom of the program says. If it doesn't show up, it probably isn't getting enough power. Try a different USB port.

 

[joeocal]

ok, disregard the "for the most part" part. i thought it was having problems on the other computer but i was wrong about that.

I tried the other ports and it didn't change anything.

yeah, its USB, no independent power source.

after plugging it in, it doesn't show up in disk utility.

is there anything i can do to increase power to that port, or overall? i have used it quite a bit before without any problem like this. its plugged in to the AC power, and there isn't any other hardware plugged in, drawing power from it.

also, the other computer i tried is exactly the same model and specs as mine, and it doesn't seem to have any problems.

thanks again.

 

[BlueRevolution]

Contact Western Digital and ask for a Y-cable. SeaGate's drives come with 'em, but strangely WD's don't. Basically, the cable just includes a second USB plug which allows the drive to draw more power.

 

[joeocal]

oh, sweet. that sounds like the answer. thanks a lot everybody.