Try a Windows computer – perhaps the Western Digital (WD) drive is formatted for Windows and can’t be read by your MacBook, iMac or Mac Mini. Try another Mac to see if you can access the Western Digital (WD) drive there.ĥ.

Go to Finder > Preferences > General and make sure that there is a tick beside External Drives.Ĥ. Make sure your Mac is set to show mounted Western Digital (WD) drives on the desktop. If there is no volume listed, the Mac is not able to access the Western Digital (WD) drive. If after running First Aid the Mac finds errors, then you can solve it by “ Repair Disk” optionĢ. To do this, click on the “ First Aid” tab and select Run. You could try running the First Aid through Disk Utility. Look in the list on the left to see if the Western Digital (WD) hard drive appears there. Then start typing Disk Utility, press enters to open the program. Find Disk Utility by opening Spotlight (Cmd + Spacebar). Open Apple’s Disk Utility to see if you can get the Mac to see the Western Digital (WD) drive there. Tips to Solve Western Digital Hard Drive not RecognisingĬertain tips could prove helpful in resolving the WD unrecognized error :ġ. OS corruption making the WD external drive unrecognized.Owing to wear and tear of the Western Digital hard drive due to continuous overuse.Due to abrupt system termination when the drive still connected.If WD suffered physical damage from mishandling or dropping of the Western Digital drive.After a sudden power surge while the drive is being used for file transfer process.On Mac, knowing why a Western Digital drive is not being detected plays a significant role in identifying and resolving the issue.

Why Western Digital External Drive Not Recognized Error shows on macOS:

Summary: “The external hard drive was not recognized by Mac” error can be resolved by using the help of special tips mentioned in this blog.Īlso, Stellar Data Recovery Free Edition for Mac Software can be used as a data rescue tool to retrieve the files stored on the external drive.

Wd drive utility mac