WD Blue WD40EZRZ 4TB HDD and WD10EZEX 1TB Were Working But Now Not Even Recognized :(

WD Internal Drives Internal Drives
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Hi, all. I have a bit of a conundrum and need help. Specifically, I have some Western Digital Blue high-capacity HDDs that worked just fine before I upgraded my PC. I suspected the issue was with the new motherboard but the HDDs aren’t recognized in its BIOS, or in Windows, or Linux. I’ve updated the new motherboard BIOS and scrubbed it for any clue as to a setting that might prevent recognition. Nothing presented itself.

Drive manufacturer support thinks there may be an incompatibility between the drives and the new mobo. While not indicated in the motherboard’s SSD Support List, the HDDs are not exactly old or niche models. The new motherboard support had no answers for me.

The HDDs have been connected directly to the motherboard, as well as by external SATA connectors and enclosures.
The presences of the HDDs are recognized in Windows Disk Management, but they’re otherwise non-workable. Can’t even assign a drive letter.
I attempted to convert between MBR-GPT partition formats but, again, the drives recognize as present but I can’t actually do anything with them.

One last thing that may be of some import: the HDDs served as data storage, not boot drives.

The problem children are Western Digital’s WD Blue WD40EZRZ 4TB HDD and WD Blue WD10EZEX 1TB HDD.

The before and after specs (I’m including as much component info as I can on the off chance there’s some type of crazy incompatibility):
Intel Core i7-8700K@3.7 GHz (4.7 GHz Turbo) LGA 1151
MSI Z370-A PRO LGA 1151 (300 Series)
Corsair Ballistix BLS2K16G4D26BFSE Sport LT (16GBx2) DDR4 2666 (PC4-21300)
EVGA GeForce GTX 1080 FTW2 8GB DDR5 08G-P4-6686-KR
Western Digital Blue WD5000AAKX-6 500GB HDD (oddly enough, this works just fine in the config below)
LG WH16NS40 SATA 16x Blu-ray Disc Rewriter
Enermax ERB600AWT RevoBron 600W 80+ Bronze

Intel Core i7-12700
Gigabyte Z790 UD AC, LGA 1700, ATX, DDR5
G.Skill RipJaws S5 (F5-6000J3238F16GA2-RS5W) 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR5 6000
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX
Crucial P3 (CT4000P3SSD8) 4TB PCIe 3D NAND 3.0x4 NVMe M.2 SSD
Samsung PM991 256 GB 3.0x4 NVMe M.2 SSD
LG WH16NS40 SATA 16x Blu-ray Disc Rewriter
Corsair RM850x (CP-9020200-NA), 850W 80+ Gold ATX

So there you have it. I’m stumped, but I’m hoping someone in the know can recommend a fix or workaround. Thanks in advance for any assistance.

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I have the same problem with the Intel Core i7-12700 (in a Dell 8950). It is recognized in the Device manager and indicated it’s working properly, but does not show up in the file manager. The Microsoft tech online assist indicated the drive needed to be reformatted (and, of course, loosing all of the data on that 4TB drive) in order for it to be recognized. The drive was BitLocker encrypted and the tech person suggested the the drive needed to be decrypted on the old system before it could be recognized. 36 hours later, with the drive decrypted, I still have the same issue in the new system (recognized by the Device Manager, but not in the File Manager).
Any help would be appreciated.

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The Device Manager indicated the drive was recognized and ‘Working Properly’. The internal drive was not showing in the File manager because the system had not assigned it a drive letter. The WD tech walked me through what needed to be done. First the WD Dashboard had to be downloaded and installed. The newest version at this time is 3.8.2.10. With the Dashboard open, the malfunctioning drive was selected in the upper right-hand (Select Device). Then, using the Disk Management tool, right-click on the box representing the drive and choose “Change drive letter and paths…” and enter a drive letter such as Z:, and now it shows in the File manager. The tech also suggested to format the disk after any data is copied to another drive (in case there is any corrupted data or file system), but so far all of the data appears to be intact. It’s now working properly. :slight_smile: