My 5TB External Hard Drive Files Disappear Until I Reboot It

I have a WD 5TB external drive that I keep my movies and tv series on. I also use Plex. For no reason or no particular length of time I will go to access the files in the folders and there is nothing there. It says the folder is empty. However, when I reboot the drive the files will appear again. This is driving me nuts. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

JUST A GUESS

Sounds like the PC in question may have gone into sleep / standby mode and may not have enough power at the USB port to fully spin up the 5 TB External after coming out of sleep mode.

USB Root Hub Power Controls

Disable the ability for the computer to turn off the USB Root Hub to save power:

  • Access Device Manager. For assistance, please see Answer ID 278: How to access Device Manager in Windows
  • Expand USB Serial Bus Controllers
  • Right-click on USB Root Hub
  • Choose Properties
  • Select the Power Management tab
  • Uncheck Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power and click OK to save the changes. Repeat for all remaining USB Hubs
  • Restart the computer

If the device is still not recognized, undo the changes by Checking the Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power for all USB hubs, After saving the changes, Restart the computer.

Thank you very much! It’s been 3 days now since following your instructions and it hasn’t acted up since!