What to do if the computer does not see the internal hard drive. The computer does not see the disk

People who use removable storage devices sometimes encounter situations where the computer (PC) does not see the hard drive (HDD). Disks, such as Transcend, Western digital, Seagate, Samsung, Ide, are gaining increasing popularity and demand among people of different ages and are used for personal purposes, in study and work. Their main purpose is the storage and exchange of information between people, and thanks to its minimal size, almost comparable to the parameters of a mobile phone, it can be easily stored among personal belongings taken with you, accommodating thousands of gigabytes.

It’s worth saying right away that cases when the computer does not see the hard drive occur quite often and turn out to be very unpleasant, especially when there is not much time. Let's try to understand the causes and possible solutions to this problem.

First of all, it is necessary to separate whether the disk is new or already previously used– this is essential in solution methods.

HDD hard drive on Windows 7, 8, 10

By a new hard drive, we mean, as is already clear, not its age, but the fact that it has never been written to and, accordingly, has not been connected to a computer or laptop.

• Click on the shortcut " My computer"right click and select " Control«.

• Find and click on “ Disk management", a window will open displaying the drives connected to the PC.

Drive letter value

A common cause of an error displaying a connected drive is the incorrect assignment of the drive letter, as a result of which the computer does not display it. Necessary detect the connected external hard drive HDD, detected by its name, size in MB (details are located at the bottom of the window) and distinguishable from the disk registered by the system, C, D, or other local disk marked when installing the operating system.

You can be sure that you have identified exactly the connected HDD: without closing the “Disk Management” window, unplug it and reconnect it to the computer; accordingly, it will disappear from the list and appear.

• Then right-click on it and select another sequential letter after those available in the system.

The disk is not formatted

Very often, connected hard drives are not visible on the computer due to the fact that they are new and have not been previously formatted. If you find them in the menu " Disk management“, changing the letter value will not work for such a disk, due to the lack of such a function. Here you need to select the value “ Create a simple volume«:

Please note that during volume creation, formatting will occur - along with the markup, the disk will be completely erased. As a result, the information stored there (if you are not sure exactly) will be completely deleted.

Lack of drivers

Another common reason that a hard drive connected to a PC is not visible is the lack of drivers for it. Despite the fact that the Windows system takes such cases into account and reacts, trying to select from the available ones or showing a window with the necessary search for drivers for the connected device. But still, failures occur and it may be that no information from the computer regarding this will appear.

• In this regard, you first need to make sure that the USB port to which you connected is working. This can be done by connecting something else that is accurately detected by the computer (for example, a flash drive).
• Then go to “ device Manager" (menu " Start" ->» Control Panel» -> « System and safety" or the key combination " Win+Pause Break" and select "Device Manager").

• Open tab " Disk devices«.

• « Other devices» and see if a device not recognized by the system is displayed with a yellow icon with an exclamation mark. If there is such a name or an undefined device (for example, the inscription “My passport”), right-click on it and select “ Update drivers«.
• You can search and update drivers in automatic mode, using special programs in the article (determining a suitable driver by hardware ID and a link to find it on the Internet).

• You can also try selecting the command “ Update system configuration" in the " tab Action". After which, the existing devices will be searched and the corresponding drivers will be installed.

The connected HDD is not visible previously used

If a disk that was previously used is not displayed, or, moreover, information is already stored on it, then you definitely need to make sure (if you don’t know for sure) that this hard drive is working by connecting it to another computer or laptop. The USB port to which the connection was made must also be in working order, and if you need to check it by connecting another device (flash drive) or check it by connecting the drive to another connector.

• If you are sure that the HDD along with the USB port is working, then you need to open the menu “ Disk management" (Pressing " My computer» right key and selecting « Control" and then press " Disk management") and look at the available disks and their affiliation with letter value (determined by name and size). If there is such a disk, then right-click on it and select “ Change drive letter", then the button " Change" and set the next letter after the drive letters already available on the computer.

• There are cases when such disks may contain viruses and prevent them from being displayed correctly in the system or be blocked by some antiviruses (low-cost free antiviruses can do this), as a result the hard disk is not visible on the computer.

You can solve this problem by reconnecting or by trying to find this drive in the “ Disk Management"(above) and also change the letter value, perhaps some message from the antivirus will appear (about the presence of viruses or its blocking or “access denied”) and decide to check for viruses or check for viruses on another computer. After that, reconnect to the computer - if the viruses were really present and were removed as a result of the scan, then now this hard drive should start without problems (unless, of course, it was blocked for this reason).

In situations where there is little space on the hard drive, and there is not enough money for a new larger one, users choose the option of connecting a portable drive or a second HDD. Unfortunately, you can’t set them up right away, but sometimes you’re lucky and the system recognizes the device itself. If the computer does not see the hard drive both in the BIOS and in Explorer, this article will help you deal with this problem. For convenience, it is divided into several cases - when not visible in BIOS, and then in interface and, accordingly, in the list of devices.

Using a second hard drive

What we originally meant was that there is a second device (the hard drive) that you connect to the computer both internally and externally. Both options connect radically differently. The fact is that the second option works like a flash drive and there should be no problems recognizing it on a computer, but with the first case everything is a little different.

The situation is that it can work for related reasons:

• if correctly connected to the motherboard;
• if he himself is in good order;
• if the motherboard is working;
• If the drivers haven't crashed and everything works fine.

So check that HDD was correctly connected and working. A motherboard that doesn't work will immediately give itself away - the PC simply won't start. The last item on the list is the most unpleasant. If there is a driver problem, you will need to contact the device supplier so that he can resolve this issue. When, when everything works correctly and is connected, but the computer does not see the second hard drive – move on to the next paragraph of the article.

Why is the second HDD not visible in the BIOS menu?

Initially, you need to consider this option, because the menu BIOS is the face of the computer's state and in it you can see all the necessary information. Very often it is used to show the user in the store what devices are connected to the laptop or PC, what parameters are set, etc.

In order to enable the “visibility” of the hard drive in the BIOS, you need to perform either one or both options.

So the first one looks like this:

1. Turn off the computer and start it again. Immediately after the PC turns on, press the key on the keyboard F2 (sometimes DELETE) so many times until the treasured menu appears;
2. Go to the menu "Advanced", then in configuration tab equipment (may be named differently, but the word Configuration will definitely be there);
3. Find the controller line and change the status Disabled on Enabled;
4. Save the changes and exit BIOS, if the computer asks, restart the computer.

1. We repeat point No. 1 the previous instructions and now select the system configuration menu;
2. In field "Configure SATA" change AHCI to any other;
3. We repeat point number 4 previous version.

In the first case, we simply enabled the disk controller, and in the second we changed the configuration type, because some HDDs may not support AHCI. This is where all the “torture” over the BIOS ends, and we move on to setting it up from the user interface.

To immediately understand whether the system really does not see the hard drive, you need to go to the disk manager. To do this we will use the utility "Run". Call: Windows logo key + R key. Then enter the command "diskmgmt.msc" and press "OK".

You'll fall through the window "Disk Management". The instructions will be relevant for you if you have something like this:

According to the screenshot, the system has a disk that is simply not initialized. In this case, you need to immediately make it initialized. To do this, right-click on it and select “Initialize”. Then select the section style. For Windows 7, select MBR, and then click “OK”. After that, you need to create a simple volume based on this disk so that you can use the memory on the disk through “local” disks.

Right-click on the disk again and select “Create simple volume.” We assign a letter, go through all the points of the utility and confirm the actions. Then everything will be accurately displayed and working, and you will no longer worry about the answer to the question of why the computer does not see the second hard drive.

Why is the second HDD not visible on Windows 10?

As users of the new system, Tens owners are less likely to encounter the problem of displaying the disk in Explorer. Since the system is new, but the equipment is not yet very good, it happens that the HDD is not visible. In this case, you must definitely follow the same steps as for Windows 7, but with a small amendment.

This article explains in detail what to do if Windows 7 does not see the hard drive. You will also learn how to deal with errors and problems that arise when reinstalling the Windows operating system.

This is information that will be useful for everyone to know, because nowadays there is a personal computer in almost every home. Moreover, most often it is Windows that is used as the operating system. Simply put, if you have problems with the operating system while working on your computer, then this article will help you. Let's look at the situation when the system does not see the hard drive. Initially, you will need to perform a couple of simple steps:

Find the “My Computer” shortcut on your desktop, hover your mouse over it and right-click. A menu will appear in which you need to click on the “Management” line (Figure 1).

Figure 1 – Context menu

In the “Computer Management” window that opens, click on the “Disk Management” line from the “Storage Devices” category (Figure 2).

Figure 2 - Computer management

Figure 3 - Change drive letter

Now all that remains is to change the drive letters so that the OS can find it. Also, those who installed Windows 7 instead of Windows XP can move the settings of programs installed on the computer and the “My Documents” folder to the Windows system directory, which will allow them to use the new OS. Hard drive not detected during Windows reinstallation

Quite often, when reinstalling Windows, users encounter the problem that the hard drive is not detected. There are several ways to fix this problem.

Method 1. The most well-known method is to disable AHCI in the operating system through the BIOS (Basic Input Output System). Immediately after you do this, the computer will be able to detect the hard drive. Now let's describe in more detail how to do this:
1. Restart your computer. Press “F2” or “Delete” on your keyboard from the moment it starts to turn on. This will take you to the BIOS settings.
2. Select the operating system settings menu and turn off AHCI mode, as shown in (Figure 4).

Figure 4 - Disabling AHCI

Method 2. It may well be that the computer does not see the hard drive due to problems with the motherboard (when reinstalling any version of Windows). In this case, you need to download the driver for the motherboard of your computer on the Internet and burn it to disk. Next, using this disk, add the driver to the root directory of the operating system.

This is done as follows:
1. Insert the driver disc into the drive.
2. Restart the computer and while it turns on, press “F6” on the keyboard.

Method 3. If the two methods described above did not bring the desired result, then you will have to integrate SATA drivers into the OS distribution. The first step is to integrate individual SATA drivers or, in some cases, entire packages. You can also integrate drivers together with updates.

You can find out exactly what updates and drivers are required on the website of the manufacturer of your motherboard installed on your computer. To find out what kind of motherboard you have, you can right-click on the “My Computer” shortcut and through the drop-down menu go to “Properties”, where this data is indicated. You can also look at this information in the documents that were given to you when you purchased the computer.
It is worth saying that a large number of users encounter a situation where the system does not see the hard drive, especially when reinstalling Windows. If you also encounter this problem, then it is not necessary to contact a service center or specialists to solve it. You can handle it quite well on your own.

First of all, if the hard drive is not detected when reinstalling the operating system, you must resort to the methods described earlier (integrating motherboard drivers and disabling the AHCI parameter through the BIOS). If these actions did not give the desired result, then you will need to check whether the connection is made correctly on your hard drive. Figure 5 shows an example of a correct connection.

Figure 5 - Connecting a hard drive

The main thing you should learn for yourself is that the device, thanks to which the hard drive is connected and attached to the computer motherboard, has two main connectors. One of them is black, the second is blue (cyan). Moreover, this characteristic is the same regardless of what version of the Windows operating system you have. Of interest to us is the blue connector, which is responsible for the operation of the hard drive and floppy drive (device for external reading). It is better to connect the hard drive to the blue connector, because, as practice has shown, the black connector is quite unstable.

If, after checking the connection, the hard drive is still not detected or a message is displayed stating that the HDD device is not working correctly, then most likely it is all due to software errors.

If none of the methods described above helped, you will have to contact qualified specialists.

One press of a button is enough for the computer to turn on. Unfortunately, there are times when the system fails to initialize the hard drive. In this case, the problem may arise not only with the additional hard drive, but also with the main HDD. Why doesn’t the computer see the hard drive and how to deal with it?

In fact, there are several reasons that contribute to hard drive failure. In most cases, the problem can be fixed on your own. To correct the situation, you need to understand the reason that caused the breakdown.

The main reasons for the “disappearance” of a disk

When a hard drive disappears, the first thing that comes to mind is the incorrect connection of the hard drive to the motherboard. In fact, there are several reasons that cause this problem. The main “failures” of the storage medium include:

• Lack of contacts;
• The disk boot priority is incorrectly specified;
• Old operating system;
• The system does not support the connection interface;
• Lack of drivers;
• Lack of nutrition;
• Missing section letter;
• Device conflict;
• BIOS failure.

It doesn’t matter why the computer does not see the hard drive, you need to understand what to do in a given situation.

A common reason that causes a hard drive to “disappear” can be considered to be an incorrect connection. When connecting a cable or power cable, users sometimes do not insert the chips tightly. As a result, the motherboard does not see the hard drive.

The same situation may occur if the connector on the motherboard is not functioning. To correct the situation, you need to double-check the correct connection, as well as the functionality of the port (it is best to temporarily use a different connector). The same applies to cables; it is better to replace them.

Disk boot priority

If you have connected the hard drive correctly, but the system does not see it, most likely the problem is with boot priorities. To fix the problem, you need to enter the BIOS. To do this, press one of the following buttons (each computer has its own key):

• Delete;

When the BIOS loads, go to the “Boot” tab. After this, you need to install your disk in the “Hard Disk Boot Priority” item. Once the setup is complete, you need to press the F10 button for the changes to be saved and the computer to restart. Now all that remains is to wait for the system to boot.

Old operating system

Technologies do not stand in one place. Every year new storage media appear, the volume of which is growing in arithmetic progression. Many users purchase hard drives with a capacity of 1 TB or more, but do not want to part with outdated operating systems. For example, Windows XP.

Unfortunately, legacy systems are not capable of handling large volumes. The problem can be solved by simply reinstalling the operating system. If you don’t want to do this, you can use specialized software such as Partition Manager. The programs add support for hard drives up to 2 TB.

Connection interface problem

Another problem with outdated operating systems is the detection of the SATA connector. If you connect a hard drive to such a port, the system will not detect it. You can solve the problem by reinstalling the OS.

Those who don’t want to part with their favorite OS need to go to a store that sells SATA-IDE adapters. It should be noted right away that such devices may not be available in every store, so it will take some time until the adapter is delivered to the warehouse.

Lack of drivers

A similar situation occurs on weak computers that have an outdated operating system installed. When new devices come onto the market (hard drives are no exception), operating system developers add all the necessary drivers to the distribution.

If the hard drive was connected, but the system identified it as an unknown device, you need to download drivers. This can be done either from the official website of the manufacturer or using special driver packs. For example, Driver Pack Solution.

Installation does not take much time. After installing the drivers, the hard drive will be automatically detected. You may need to restart your computer.

Lack of nutrition

Some users of old devices write: “what to do if the computer does not see the disk.” At the same time, the wires and connectors are working, and the system is new. In fact, the reason for the absence of a hard drive may be a simple lack of power.

When purchasing a new drive, you need to ask the seller how much energy the device consumes. It is also necessary to calculate how much energy the system unit and all its components consume. After this, you need to pay attention to your power supply. Maybe he's just weak. In order for the hard drive to work, you will have to consider purchasing a more powerful power supply.

Partition letter missing

There are times when the system does not see a hard drive connected as an additional drive. If the OS installed the driver, “traces” of the hard drive are detected in the device manager, but the drive is not displayed in “My Computer,” you need to go to administration.

To do this, open Start and then select Control Panel. In the window that opens, you need to click on the “Administration” section.

After a second, a new window will open with a list of control elements. You need to find the Computer Management section and then go to it.

In the next step, in the left column you need to find the “Disk Management” item. All connected drives will be assigned a letter, except the one you recently connected. You need to right-click on the hard drive, and then select “Change drive letter” from the context menu. Now all that remains is to select any letter. It is recommended that you restart your computer for the changes to take effect.

It is important to note that in rare cases, even after assigning a letter, the hard drive does not appear in “My Computer”. Most likely the reason is an unsupported file system. In "Disk Management", you need to call the context menu with the right mouse button, and then format the system by installing the NTFS file system.

There is a device conflict

Users sometimes do not understand why the computer does not see the disk if the connection is made correctly? In rare cases, a device conflict may occur. This happens when two identical drives made by the same company are installed.

To fix the problem, you need to connect the drive to the motherboard one by one, and then specify in the BIOS the hard drive on which the operating system is installed.

BIOS failure

It is extremely rare that a situation may occur when the BIOS fails. It is difficult to say why the computer does not see the disk in this case. Sometimes a DVD-ROM or video card may disappear. The problem can be resolved by resetting the BIOS.

First you need to turn off the power to your PC. Then find the jumper (small “contact closure”) located on the motherboard. It can be found near the battery. The jumper should be moved to pins 2-3. Now you need to wait about 15 seconds. This time should be enough to reset the settings. All that remains is to return the jumper to its original location and restart the computer. The system will automatically detect the new disk.

If you are unable to find the jumper, it is recommended to use the second method of resetting the BIOS. After turning off the power, you need to remove the round battery from the motherboard. The reset will occur within one minute. When the battery is returned to its place, the computer can be turned on.

Do I need to contact specialists?

In 95% of cases, any user can handle connecting a hard drive. If you have tried all the methods described above and the hard drive still does not appear on the computer, you can contact a specialist. Most likely the problem is a broken hard drive or motherboard.

You can also contact specialists if the disk is malfunctioning. In this case, the device makes characteristic sounds, errors appear, or the disk disappears completely.

Conclusion

Most often, users who discover a disk connection problem begin to get nervous. You need to calm down, as serious consequences may arise. You should analyze the situation and then go through the methods described above. In most cases, you can solve the problem on your own. If you decide to use specialized software, carefully study the functionality and instructions.

Video review: what to do if the PC does not see the hard drive?

Most users create partitions on their hard drive for their convenience. They are usually called C, D, etc., and their usefulness cannot be denied in any way. Let's say you have an operating system on one volume, and all other user files (music, photos, movies) on the second. When you reinstall the OS, the partition with your files will not even be touched, which will allow you to save your data and continue to use it in the new Windows.

One of the extremely common problems that users often encounter is that the computer does not see hard drive partitions and cannot find them. This problem occurs unexpectedly and can be caused by a number of reasons that affect the operation of the hard drive. Let's figure out what to do in this situation and how to solve the problem that has arisen.

Assigning a letter

If your PC or laptop does not see one of the hard drive partitions, then the first thing you need to do is go to the special control menu and check whether it is displayed in the corresponding list. If it is there, then it needs to be assigned a letter.

Let's look at the process in order:

The requested information will be instantly displayed on the screen. It is necessary to look through the local drives, and if there is one that has disappeared, then you need to set the letter.

To do this you need:

For the changes to be successfully applied, you need to restart your computer. As soon as the operating system boots, check whether the partition is visible, it should appear under the letter you specified.

Creating a new volume

It is likely that when you go to the management menu you will not find the missing area, instead there will be an unallocated part that cannot be assigned a letter; you can only create a new volume:

But at the same time, you will completely lose the files stored on it. Therefore, if you do not value them, then feel free to use this method; in other cases, I recommend using the method discussed below.

All processes are analyzed using Windows 7 as an example, but in other versions, Windows XP/8/10, they will be similar.

Creating a new partition

If the first method did not help and the computer still does not see the hard drive partitions, then the problem may be that the OS itself cannot see it due to the loss of the file system, as often happens, but the data on it will still be saved.

In this case, to correct the situation, we will use one very effective tool, namely the Acronis Disk Director program. With its help, we will recognize the disappeared local hard drive partition, separate a small part from it, from which we will make a new area with the NTFS file system, and then simply merge them.

This may seem very difficult to some, but if you follow the following instructions, which detail what to do in this situation, you will easily cope with this task:

After you create a partition, all that remains is to merge the problematic and new partitions using the “Merge” function.

Now you need to save the changes and reboot the system. To do this, you need to enter the BIOS again and return the boot to its original location - from the Hard Disk. After exiting the BIOS, the system will automatically boot into Windows OS. We check the disk partition again, now it should definitely be displayed correctly.

Partition recovery

In almost all cases when a logical partition of a hard drive disappears, it can be returned. For recovery we will use the same Acronis Disk Director.
So here's how to do it:

The procedure for restoring information from a partition that the PC has stopped seeing can take a significant amount of time. The duration of the process depends on the amount and volume of data available on the disk. Therefore, you should be prepared for the fact that the computer may work for quite a long time.

We hope that the methods we have listed for solving the problem are easy to implement, and you can use them to fix the problems that have arisen.

Video: how to solve the problem of unallocated space in Windows 10