Hello, I have a 500GB WD My Passport external hard drive which I use on my MacBook Air. Since a few months ago the drive just stopped showing off in Finder. When I opened Disk Utility I could see the drive there as greyed out. But nothing happened when pressing “Mount”. I wish not to lose the information on my drive since there is backups from years back. Please help me with a solution to my problem.
This article will explain how to fix WD My Passport not mounting/showing up/recognized/detected. WD external hard drive won't mount on Mac, how to fix? First of all, if your WD external hard drive is listed on the left-hand-side menu of Disk Utility, you can make sure it doesn't have any hardware problem. I have exactly the same problem.Time Machine backup (WD Passport) does not mount after upgrading from High Sierra 10.13.2 to 10.13.4 (on Desktop). I have checked the disk on my lap top running Yosemite and the disc is fine.
In general, when a stable WD My Passport gets plugged into Mac, the drive will be readily available on the Desktop, Finder, and Disk Utility. Then it is possible to has full read-write access to the WD My Passport. However, there are times when yourMy Passport for Mac is not showing up in Finder or greyed out in Disk Utility. Why does this happen? It's most likely that the WD My Passport is logically corrupted and the operating system fails to mount it.
WD external hard drive shows up in Disk Utility but won't mount? Don't be upset, this article will throw some light on WD My Passport greyed out in Disk Utility issue. Also, recovering files from unmountable WD My Passport on Mac is also talked about in this blog.
How to fix WD My Passport greyed out in Disk Utility?
The good news is that your WD My Passport or other external hard drives greyed out in Disk Utility indicates that the drive isn't physically damaged but has some issues with the partition table or some other corruption at the file system level. Thus, Mac built-in utilities are enough to fix WD My Passport for Mac not mounting issue.
Fix 1: Run First Aid to repair the unmounted WD My Passport
Disk Utility's First Aid is a drive diagnostic which can be used to test for defects or problems on a mac.
Step 1: Go to Disk Utility (found in the Applications > Utilities folder).
Step 2: Mac studio fix powder review. Select the unmounted WD My Passport for Mac in Disk Utility.
Step 3: Click First Aid on the top of the window.
Step 4: Click Done when the repair finished.
Fix 2: Reformat to fix WD My Passport greyed out in Disk Utility
Sometimes,First Aid failed on the WD external hard drive since it has serious logical errors. In this case, reformatting is the most effective solution to bring back the WD My Passport to a normal working state. But this process will erase all data stored on the drive. If the drive contains important files, you should recover lost data from unmountable WD My Passport firstly.
Step 1: Recover lost data from unmountable WD My Passport
iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is free Mac data recovery software which helps you recover documents, pictures, audios, videos, emails from the unmountable, unreadable, formatted, corrupted external hard drives, hard drives, USB flash drives, SD cards, etc. It is compatible withmacOS Catalina 10.15/Mojave 10.14/High Sierra 10.13/10.12 and OS X 10.11/10.10/10.9/10.8/10.7.
Tutorial to recover lost data from unmountable WD My Passport:
1. Download and install iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac on Mac.
![My wd passport stopped working My wd passport stopped working](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ZLVbPm9_FbU/maxresdefault.jpg)
2. Launch iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
3. Select the unmounted WD My Passport and click 'Next' button to scan all lost data.
4. Mac soar lip liner and velvet teddy. Preview the searching results, choose files you need, and click 'Recover' to get them back.
Step 2: reformat to fix WD My Passport for Mac not mounting
Afterwards, you can now courageously proceed to erase your WD My Passport.
• How to erase external hard drive on Mac?
Summary: Let’s figure out how to format your WD Passport on macOS & Windows. In this blog post, we will walk you through the formatting process and share instructions to format an external drive on macOS & Windows.
But before you proceed, understand that formatting carries a risk of hard drive corruption and data loss. So, in case, if you had accidentally lost your data due to drive formatting or corruption, we also recommend a data recovery software that can rescue data from your HDD. Take a free trial to evaluate the software now.
But before you proceed, understand that formatting carries a risk of hard drive corruption and data loss. So, in case, if you had accidentally lost your data due to drive formatting or corruption, we also recommend a data recovery software that can rescue data from your HDD. Take a free trial to evaluate the software now.
Professional Photographers and videographers have their hands laid upon various digital devices. Usually, their arsenal includes a cutting-edge Windows 10 desktop, the latest and the magnificent MacBook Pro, DSLR & SD-Cards of-course and the trusted & loved external drives such as the WD My Passport. The role of the WD My Passport drive is crucial since the individual will leverage the portable media to safely store their collection of pictures, videos, audio, and docs. But despite the best of the best device specifications; there remains one small glitch to rectify.
We know, Macs and Windows have their native file systems such as the new APFS or HFS and the NTFS. A WD My Passport formatted with Mac file system will be a dud on the Windows and vice-versa. Thankfully, MS-DOS FAT32 and ex-FAT formats have survived to date, and these are the file system to make your WD My Passport work with a Mac and a Windows PC simultaneously. In the next 5 minutes read, you will master yourself in formatting a WD My Passport safely and in a manner best suited for sharing your digital files between a macOS and Windows OS.
To format a Western Digital My Passport external hard drive in ex-FAT or FAT32 format, you can bank on built-in applications of Mac & PC. However, while doing this, there are things you have to keep in mind and follow the correct steps. Here you will get to know about the process to format your “My passport” portable drive in FAT32 and ex-FAT file system in both Windows and Mac platforms.
In Windows Platform:
1. Connect your Western Digital My Passport hard drive to your Windows PC through the USB cable. Wait till the Windows detects the external hard drive and configure it as an expansion drive automatically.
2. Now, click the Start button and select ‘This PC’. A new Windows Explorer window opens, on the left side of the screen; you will see a list of installed drives and their drive letters.
3. Locate the icon assigned to Western Digital My Passport drive and Right-click the connected drive icon and click ‘Format’ in the pop-up menu.
Wd My Passport Ultra Not Recognized
4. Select the ‘File System’ from the drop-down list, which is available in the format expansion and choose either ‘ex-FAT’ or ‘FAT32’.
5. Enter a relevant name in the ‘Volume Label’ field. This name will represent your drive when you connect it with Windows Explorer or Mac and will be mentioned above the drive letter for the My Passport drive. Therefore, enter a descriptive name.
6. Now, again select a ‘Quick Format’ option, then click ‘Start’ option, wait for a few minutes to get your drive reformatted with the FAT32 file system, so that you can use it. After successful formatting, you can directly save or move files to it like any other external hard drive.
In macOS / OS X Platform
- Connect your Western Digital My Passport drive to Mac computer, and let the OS detect and mount the drive for use. Now, a new hard drive icon will appear on the desktop.
- On macOS Dock, select Finder. When the Finder window opens, on the menu bar, select ‘Go’ and then ‘Utilities.’ After that, you will be able to see /Applications/Utilities folder in Finder. From the Utilities folder window, select ‘Disk Utility’ application.
- When the Disk Utility opens, choose the Western Digital hard drive icon from the sidebar.
- Click ‘Erase’ on the Disk Utility file menu. Now, the Erase dialogue window appears, here select the ‘Volume Format’ drop-down list and choose ‘MS-DOS (FAT)’ or ex-FAT File System.’ Note: ex-FAT is a better choice for formatting WD My Passport on Mac.
- Now, click the ‘Erase,’ button and wait a few minutes and let the macOS erase data on the drive and reformat it by FAT32 or ex-FAT format.
- Once formatting is done, you can use the drive in macOS or OS X as a regular hard drive.
Window’s Disk Management and Mac’s Disk Utility applications are secure platforms to erase your WD My Passport easily. You don’t require any third-party software to format your WD My Passport with FAT or ex-FAT.
![Mac Mac](https://goodsph.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/wd-my-passport-for-mac.jpg)
Wd My Passport Not Mounting Macos
Caution: Avoid Formatting your WD My Passport without Backup
We can’t rule out the possibilities of human errors resulting in the accidental formatting of the WD My Passport external drive. A silly man-made mistake will permanently remove all of the contained pictures, videos, audio files, and docs instantly from the WD My Passport. Hence, fasten your seat-belts and backup your WD My Passport before erasing. If you have already joined the data loss club unwillingly, then try running D-I-Y applications to recover data from Mac and Windows.
Tips for Effective Formatting
My Passport For Mac Wd
- Format your Western Digital My Passport external hard drive to FAT32 or ex-FAT format so to transfer the data between a Mac and Windows system conveniently.
- There are specific third-party systems, like Digital Camcorders, and Sony PlayStation 3, which need the drives to be formatted in either FAT32 or ex-FAT format to perform read from and write operation. Check it before selecting a file format.
- Due to some limitations FAT32 format is not useful for every type of user, and also affects both Mac’s and PC’s performances. Therefore, it is better to choose ex-FAT instead.
- Ex-FAT supports maximum volume size up to 128 PiB, and its supported maximum file size is 128 PiB.
- Like FAT32, ex-FAT is not a very commonly used file system, due to which its support may vary among third-party devices.
- The corruption chances of the external drive increases, if it is used on both Mac and PC systems regularly. Therefore, it is better to take backup of your important photos and videos before sharing them between both the computers.