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After reading this article you will be able to fix some of the problems that stop a user from using their external USB hard disk drives properly & will also help in the situation where your Windows Operating system based computer does not detect your external Hard disk drive.

There are quite a few explanations for this problem & I have compiled this guide to address almost all of the known issues & help a user get rid of these problems for a smoother computing experience.

This guide addresses the most basic & the complex procedures to resolve some problems with your external hard disk drive. Follow the steps below:

Checking USB Connection

• If you External drive is USB powered, make sure that your cable is connected properly and the USB slot is a powered slot.
• Try replacing the USB Cable
• If your external drive is powered through an adapter, make sure your adapter is working fine, replace and check, if necessary.
• Try plugging your drive into another USB port

USB Drivers

• Always make sure that you have the latest USB & Chipset drivers installed in your computer.
• To check, run windows update to update your computer
• or
• Go to your motherboard / system manufacturer’s support website, download & install the latest drivers from there.

Device Management

• If you plug-in your device & it does not show up in my computer. The first thing to check is that whether your device has been detected in your computer or not.

• To check

• Go to start menu & type Device Manager
• 
• Now, there are two things to check here. The first thing is whether your device is listed within disk drives of not. Check the screenshot above to confirm that my Seagate Go Flex USB device is listed there. In a similar way, you external USB device should be listed here.
• Just to make sure click the last button, just under Help menu, to refresh the hardware listed there & to install any newly added device.
• Second, thing to check is your Universal Serial Bus Controllers, list therein ( device manager ) & make sure all USB ports and enabled and are working properly.

Now,

• Go to start menu and type device management or right click the computer icon and click on device management ( you might have to provide administrator password here )

• Double click on storage
• Double Click on Disk Management
• 
• Refer the screenshot above and make sure all of your drives listed here have a drive letter assigned to them,
• if you see a drive that does not has a drive letter assigned to them
• Right Click that drive
• Click on Change Drive letters & paths
• Now, add a drive letter here.

Running Disk Diagnostics

• Sometimes due to a error in file system or on the disk, your hard disk might just fail to detect in your computer system.
• An easy way is to gain access to a diagnostic software that might be available free to you on the hard disk manufacturer’s website.
• Download & install such software.
• Run the software to detect issues with your drive

Using a Live Disk, just to check

• If you have any live disk with you, you can boot from that disk to check if it detects external drive.
• Gparted live CD is a good tool to start with
• If a Live CD detects your drive, it’s time to repair your Windows installation.
• Check your disk for errors before exiting the live CD

Repairing Windows File System

• If you have a Windows CD / DVD with you or if you have a Windows 7 repair disc, boot from it
• On the first menu press Shift + F10
• This will open up the command prompt
• type diskpart
• type list disk
• If you see your external disk here
• type select disk n ( n being the no. example 0 , 1 ,2 listed besides your disk )
• if everything seems fine here ( size, file system etc. )
• type exit
• type exit again
• Run CHKDSK with the drive letter
• Boot back into Windows
• Go to, Run ( Windows key + R )
• Type, SFC /SCANNOW
• wait for the process to complete

IF this does not solve your problem

• check if you can open up your external enclosure
• Take your drive out and plug it directly into your computer system
• If your drive works, backup your data
• Buy another External enclosure
• Plugin your drive to check if it works
• Make sure you backup your data before doing any of this.
• Format your drive ( repartitioning is also recommended )
• NOTE: Do any of the above said steps at your own risk. Do not open your computer hardware or your HDD external enclosure, if you are not comfortable with it. Hire a professional to do it instead. If any damage or warranty violations occur, the author of this article will not be held responsible for it.

After reading this guide you will be able to fix a problem where Device manager when opened shows no hardware listed or you may call it an empty device manager. This problem has been encountered in Windows XP, Vista & Windows 7. There are a few fixes that can sort this problem. Below is the list of solutions according to your operating system. Some of the solutions mentioned below apply to all Windows Operating system with just a few minor changes.

Universal Fixes

• System Restore ( Follow This Guide )
• Else
• System File Checker ( SFC )

• If you are using Windows XP, Insert the Windows CD / DVD into the drive. For Windows Vista & 7 CD /DVD is not needed.
• Go to run ( Windows Key + R )
• Type SFC /SCANNOW
• This will take sometime to complete.

Windows XP

Note: Before Editing Registry Follow this guide to Backup Your Registry

• Go to Start Menu
• Click on Run
• Type regedit
• Expand HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
• Expand SYSTEM
• Expand CurrentControlSet
• Select Enum
• Click on Security , Permission menu
• Click Add
• Add the group Everyone and user SYSTEM
• Select Everyone
• Check Read only
• Select system
• Check Full Control
• Click the Advanced button ( at the bottom)
• Check Reset permissions on all child objects
• Click ok
• Click yes
• Close the Registry Editor

Windows 7 / Vista

• The very first steps should be to follow the universal repair procedure mentioned at the top of the guide.
• Use This guide to try Clean boot in Windows Vista, 7 
• Making a new user account

• Go to Control Panel
• Click User Accounts
• Click on Manage Another Account
• Click on Create a new account
• Select the type as Administrator
• Assign a new name & a password if required
• Log Off
• Login to the new account at the welcome window
• Check Device Manager

After reading this short article, you will be able to properly configure your Solid State Drive ( SSD ) for better performance in Windows Operating system. If you have a new SSD in your hands and you are thinking about Installing Windows on it, make sure that your drive is aligned properly & within your BIOS the controller or SATA type is set to AHCI. While booting from Windows Disk and just before you select the Disk Press Shift + F10 and follow this guide . Below are some tips that you can use to gain some performance boost when using SSD in Windows.

• Make Sure you are using your computer in AHCI mode.
• Turn off Defragment service. ( Start menu –> type Service.msc)
• Turn off indexing service ( SSD drives are fast enough and using indexing service is a waste of time )
• Some online blogs /sites suggest turning off Superfetch. I would suggest not to turn it off. I found performance degradation while the superfetch service was tunred off. ( Though It’s your wish )
• DO Not turn off write caching ( even if it’s not needed )
• Make Sure Trim is working on your Windows system

• To Check TRIM

• Go to Start Menu
• Type CMD
• Right Click CMD
• Run as Administrator
• 
• Now, on the Command Prompt
• Type fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify

• 
• If the result you get says DisableDeleteNotify=0
• Trim is Enabled
• In the end, make sure you drivers & Windows is up to date. Run Windows update to check.

After reading this you will be able to align the your Solid State Drive (SSD) or a conventional Hard Disk Drive ( HDD ). Disk partitioning is rather a easy task these days where Windows automatically determines the best settings and partitions your Drive into volumes of your choice. Though the thing to check is that whether your drive is aligned or not. Alignment applies both to SSD & HDD, though SSD performance is somewhat more increased with a aligned drive partition. Check out this guide to first check whether your drive is properly aligned or not. If not, follow the simple steps to align your drive.

Steps to Check Drive alignment

• Automated way

• Download this tool ( Click Here )
• Run the tool to check if your disk is properly aligned or not
• Manual Way

• Go to Start Menu
• Type CMD
• Right Click Command ( CMD ) displayed at the start menu search box
• Click Run as Administrator

• 
• Type diskpart
• Type List Disk
• Type Select Disk x  ( X being the number assigned to your drive ) example 0, 1 , 2.
• Check out the offset of the first partition & make sure it is divisible by 4 or 4096 ( KB )
• Follow the screenshot below

• 
• Guide to Align the Partition

• Reinstalling with proper Aligned Disk ( NOTE: This Operation will delete all your data, so take a backup first )

• Boot with the Windows Disk
• At the Drive Selection Menu Press Shift + F10 to bring up Command prompt
• Type Diskpart
• Type List Disk
• Type Select Disk x ( x being the number of your disk) ( Refer screenshot above)
• Type Clean ( Only use this command if you want to clean all partitions ) ( if you have multiple partitions and want to just delete one partition use the process below )
• Type List partition
• Select Partition x ( X being your primary partition )
• Delete partition
• Repeat the step if you have that 100 MB partition Windows makes.
• Now,
• Select Disk X ( X being the disk number )
• Create partition primary align=4096
• Active
• Select Disk x
• Select partition 0
• Format /fs:NTFS Quick

Note: You should perform a Secure Erase before following this guide to align & repartition if you are using a SSD. ( DO NOT FULL FORMAT THE SSD, EVER)

After reading this you will be able to solve the error messages saying “Access Denied” on your Windows Computer System, even with elevated / administrator privilege. There are quite a few reasons due to which you can receive these type of error messages. Some of the related error circumstances are :

• You Re-installed or upgraded Windows to a new version & now you cannot open or modify a folder.
• You have two Administrator accounts on the same PC & you cannot access single / few / multiple files or folders
• You have a multi-boot operating system environment and you cannot access files from a specific drive or folder.

Some of the best ways to rectify this problem are:

• Take ownership of the folder:

• Right-click the folder that you want to take ownership of, and then click Properties.

• 
• Click the Security tab, click Advanced, and then click the Owner tab.

• 
• Click Edit.  If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.
• Click the name of the person you want to give ownership to.
• Click OK.

• If you have upgraded from Windows XP to Vista or 7

• The location of Documents & Settings can now be found under Users folder .
• Another Solution can be to simply copy the files to a new location before trying to open them
• If your files are set as Read-only or Protected System Files

• Follow this Guide : Click here
• You are trying to read Encrypted Files

• Try going to Command Prompt

• Start menu –> type CMD –> Right Click –> Run as Administrator
• Navigate to the folder that you wish to read
• Type Cipher.exe /r

• Check your Drive for errors

• Sometimes a particular folder might not give you access if there is a file system error on the disk

• Right Click the Drive in Computer
• Go to Tools
• Check Now
• Check the Checkbox saying Automatically Fix File system errors
• Alternatively you can

• Run CHKDSK utility from the command prompt ( Run as Administrator )