My passport can not read by windows 7

Portable Drives My Passport
1

Can anyone help me how to fix my 1TB passport essential, it used to be working ok on my laptop, but last week all of sudden when i plug in to my laptop the harddrive are not detected, i check on device manager it’s not showing also.

Please help me with these problem…:cry:

2

Hello and welcome to the community.

I recommend you try some basic troubleshooting:

1- Disconnect the drive from the computer and restart the computer.

2- If the computer is a desktop, connect it on the back USB port (directly to the PC, not through a hub).

3- Make sure you hear the connection sound windows makes when recognizes a USB device.

4- Go to "Disk Management” to verify if the drive shows up there.

If the drive shows up in disk management but it is not seen on Computer, then it means the partition is corrupted and you will have to format it in order to use it again. Please note that formatting the drive will delete all data stored on it.

3

I have the same problem with all the My Passports that I have. They used to work. They are not even recognized by the Windows 7 laptop computer (or my older Windows XP laptop).  These drives used to work on both computers but they are not even seen in the device or disk managers and there is no “sound” from Windows when they are plugged in. I downloaded the driver again and have rebooted the laptop numerous times.  This is very worrisome when this external HD is used to “backup” my data!

I think perhaps these problems are the reason that Costco no longer carries them.

Any ideas?

4

I’m not a tech guru of any sort, but I had a similar problem with one of my laptops too.  I’m right handed, so always liked to use the USB port on the left side of the laptop for plugging in the passport.  When it stopped working, I tried it on another USB port and it worked fine.  But like you, I was initially really worried because it had all of my business data on it.

5

p.s.   It’s not always the USB port. I’ve got four WD passports.  Only 2 of them are functional.

6

I just would like to share a snapshot of how I configure all my hard drives an thus possibly preventing what seem to be corruption.  If you go to device manager and pull up properties on your portable drive, there is a policy tab.  On that policy tab I alwasy choose the quick removal option which does not require you to use the safe removal process.  I can’t make any statement here cause I don’t know how everyone else has that policy option set but I wonder if perhaps many have the better performance option selected but does require you to use the safe remove hardware icon on the task bar. Just a though cause I have used WD portables for some time and maybe I am just plain lucky but have never had the type of corruption discussed in this forum.  But at the same time for just in case I have a backup of what I have stored on my portables.