Hi,
I have an older 2 TB 5,25" WD Elements Play. It has 2 primary partitions with to drive letters. In Windows I can see both drives and the data in it. But when I connect the drive via HDMI to a TV and use the user interface of the WD Elements itself, I only see one partition. How can I get access to the other patition with the builf in user interface?
wonk
Welcome to the community, wonk! The issue is that the built-in firmware on the older WD Elements Play only supports and indexes the first primary partition over HDMI, which is why it ignores your second drive letter entirely.
To access all your files on your TV, you’ll need to back up the data from the second partition, delete it using Windows Disk Management, and extend the main partition into a single NTFS volume so the media player’s interface can read everything.
Thanks for your hints. But in my case the WD interface only shows the physical second partition with the “greater” drive letter. I prefer 2 partitions, because one is a backup space. Would it help to declare one partition als “logical”?
This is likely a limitation of the Elements Play firmware, not a Windows 11 problem. Windows can mount both NTFS partitions because it fully understands the disk layout, but the old Elements Play interface was designed around a single media storage volume and does not provide a way to browse a second partition. There is no Windows setting or drive letter change that will make the missing partition appear through the HDMI interface. If you need both partitions on the TV, the practical fix is to back up the data and put it into one NTFS MBR partition within the device’s 2 TB limit.
I doubt that would help, to be honest — the limitation is almost certainly in the firmware itself rather than how the partition is declared, so switching to logical probably won’t change what it can see.
I now have coppied all data to only one primary NTFS-partition, which takes the hole disk. But still I cannot read the partition over HDMI. I tried a modern TV with Android and an old one without Android, it’s the same. It is also not possible to read the data from it over USB from TV - the HD ist not recognized. Connecting to a PC, I have no problems. Whats to do?
