In that case, you can open Disk Management to see its status. Usually, you would see the external hard drive not initialized. One situation is that you can see the exact disk space but it appears as unallocated space. The other situation is that it gives you “Disk 1 Unknown Not Initialized” without showing disk capacity. I would like to add you should source another HDD like western digital, since Seagate of late have made some crappy hdds, once you recover mbr, backup everything to the new drive, and do a full s.m.a.r.t check and bad sector check because you could have bad sectors forming, immediately noticeable if capacity of your drive has changed eg, 3tb showing up as 750gigs.
- Hard Disk Drive Showing As Unknown Device
- Disk Not Initialized Windows 10
- External Hard Drive Will Not Initialize
- Disk 1 Unknown Not Initialized External Hard Drives
Using external hard drives is the most efficient way to store your data. External hard drives are easy to use, and usually, have a longer life span than other data storage devices. Despite their ability to save data securely, you might run into trouble sometimes. You may be unable to see your external hard drive at all in your file explorer. Upon checking the status of your external hard drive, you might see 'hard drive won't initialize” in there. If you have run into this error, you can learn here how to get your data back and external hard drive running smoothly.
Method 1. Run the Disk Management utility on your computer.
Method 2. DiskPart
Method 3. Removing CMOS battery
1Reasons for a Hard Drive Not Initialized
There may be one or more than one factor causing the error. These are the factors known to be responsible for the “hard drive won't initialize” error:
Your external hard drive has experienced a virus attack.
There is a file system corruption on your computer.
A connection problem is rendering your external hard drive useless.
There is a partition loss on your external hard drive.
A corrupted master boot record is causing the error.
There is an inaccessible/unwriteable or “Bad Sector” on your external hard drive.
2How Do I Fix My External Hard Drive Won't Initialized?
As there are more than one possible reason to cause the “hard drive won’t initialize error”, you have to use all the possible solutions. In case your computer was recently attacked by a virus, you may see the “hard drive won’t initialize” error. Using Windows defender or other third-party applications, make sure that virus won't stop the computer to access the external hard drive. You can try initializing your hard drive. However, here is a warning before you try to initialize your hard drive: make sure that you have a backup of your data. To initialize your hard drive:
1Method 1. Run the Disk Management utility on your computer.
To initialize your external hard drive, right-click on it in the utility.
To start the initialization process, click the 'Initialize disk' option, and initialize your external hard drive by following the on-screen steps. This will allow you to initialize your external hard drive as an MBR or GPT disk.
If you cannot complete the initialization process because of an I/O device error, look for the connection problems. If you cannot figure out the connection problem on your computer, try connecting your external hard drive to another computer.
2Method 2. DiskPart
If you do not want to recover the data on your external hard drive, you can go for the DiskPart method. To use this method:
Press the Windows and R keys, and type “diskpart.exe” in the popped-up window.
Type “list disk” in this window.
Type “select disk (disk number)”.
To complete the process, type “clean all”.
After successfully following these steps, use “Disk management” to initialize your disk.
3Method 3. Removing CMOS battery
It might even be the case that your hard drive is not faulty at all. Your motherboard might cause the issues. To make sure that there is no problem from the motherboard end, follow these steps:
Shut down your computer.
Remove the cables from your external hard drive.
Take the CMOS battery out of your motherboard for ten seconds.
Put the CMOS battery back.
Turn your computer back again.
Shut it down once again.
Reconnect your external hard drive with your computer.
Turn your computer on.
3To Recover Your Data from External Hard Drive after Initializing
By following all the steps, you can now be able to recover the data lost in the process. In case you had not created a backup yet, it is inevitable to lose your data for hard drive initialization. However, AnyRecover allows you to get your lost data back after an external hard disk drive initialization. The main features of AnyRecover are:
Features of iMyFone AnyRecover:
Recover any accidentally lost data from an unexpected power off, formatting of your external hard drive or any other similar case.
Restore data from internal and external drives on Windows or Mac.
Supports recover data from various mediums, including Digital Camera, Memory Cards and more.
AnyRecover is capable of running on the latest Mac OS X 10.14 and Windows 10.
Using AnyRecover allows you to restore the lost data easily. Make sure to follow these steps.
Step 1.Download the AnyRecover software, locate its download position, and install it.
Step 2.To run the AnyRecover software, Double click on the desktop icon of AnyRecover to start using it.
Step 3.Select your external hard drive under the “External Removable Devices” tab.
Hard Disk Drive Showing As Unknown Device
Step 4.After selecting your external hard drive, hit the “start” button, then AnyRecover will scan your external hard drive.
Step 5.Choose your file type or folder from the listed data after scanning finished, and click on the file you want to recover, click the “recover” button to get your data back.
External hard drives are secure and portable to store data. There are not much circumstances when you run into problems using an external hard drive. However, you might see the “hard drive won't initialize” error. In such a case, follow the given ways to get your external hard drive running. However, doing so will cause the loss of your data. AnyRecover allows you to get back all the data that was lost during the process of the initialization. AnyRecover is the all-in-one solution for your data recovery needs.
Please help! When I plugged in my WD external hard drive, it said that it successfully installed, however it didn't appear on My Computer. Also when I went into Disk Management, it described as unknown, not initialized and unallocated. Anyone knows how to initialize disk without losing data?
Like the above case, 'disk unknown, not initialized and unallocated' is one of common issues in Windows 10/8/7 that annoys numerous users. It occurs not only on removable hard drives but also on internal hard drives of laptops and desktops.
Disk Not Initialized Windows 10
When the disk unknown, not initialized and unallocated error happens, you are unable to view, transfer or access the data stored on it. Want to fix disk 1 unknow, not initialized, unallocated issue immediately without losing data? Download freeunallocated partition recovery software -iBoysoft Data Recovery and let's start.
Two cases of disk 1 not initialized issue
Usually, when you run Disk Management, disk 1 may show unallocated space or no disk space. These are two cases of disk 1 not initialized issue.
1. Disk 1 displays unallocated and has disk capacity in Disk Management. It means Windows operating system has recognized this disk, but due to some reasons, the partition is lost or MBR is corrupted. In this case, you can use professional data recovery software, like iBoysoft Data Recovery, to rebuild MBR and locate all lost files.
2. No information on disk. If disk 1 doesn't show disk capacity, maybe it is because of some physical damages. You need to take the disk out and send the disk to a local data recovery professional for help.
How to fix disk 1 unknown, not initialized, unallocated in Windows 10/7/8?
External Hard Drive Will Not Initialize
When disk 1 shows unallocated space and has disk capacity, you can try the following steps.
Step 1: Recover lost data from not initialized disk
If you have important files saved in hard drive, you'd better retrieve important data from not initialized hard drive with free data recovery software first, then initialize the hard drive.
When comes to free data recovery software,iBoysoft Data Recovery is your best choice torecover lost data from not initialized hard drives,recover lost data from unallocated external hard drives, USB flash drives, SD cards, CF cards, memory cards, SanDisk cards, memory sticks, etc. in Windows XP/Vista/7/8/10 and Windows Server 2019/2016/2012/2008/2003..
How to recover lost data from not initialized hard drive?
1. Free download, install and launch iBoysoft Data Recovery on your computer.
2. Choose the not initialized disk and click 'Next' or click 'Find More Partitions' on the top of the menu bar to find lost partitions.
Disk 1 Unknown Not Initialized External Hard Drives
3. Based on capacity, select the target partition in which your important data stored and click 'Next' to search for all existing files in this partition.
4. Preview the searching results, choose those you want, and click 'Recover' button to get them back.
Lastly, have a check to ensure all lost data have been recovered. After data recovery completed, you can run Disk Management to initialize the hard drive.
Step 2: Use Disk Management to fix disk 1 not initialized error
The easiest way to fix disk 1 unknown, not initialized and unallocated error is to perform initialization in Disk Management.
Note: Disk initialization can clear all data off and cause hard drive data loss. If you have stored a large amount of data on the hard drive without a backup copy, DO NOT INITIALIZE IT but go to data recovery first.
• How to initialize an external hard drive?
With iBoysoft Data Recovery, you are also allowed to recover deleted files emptied from Recycle Bin, recover lost data from RAW drive,recover lost data from inaccessible drive, recover lost data from corrupted drive, recover lost data from unrecognized drive,recovers data from formatted drive, and recover lost data from deleted or lost partition.
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