Duplicate Volume Serial Numbers on 4TB drives

I need to change the Volume Serial Number on either of my 4TB My Book drives. The utility VOLUMEID does NOT work with either of them. After putting volumeid.exe into the c:\windows\system32 folder, I go to the system prompt as administrator and type the following command:

volumeid e: 1234-5678

(where E: is the 4TB drive) It returns with the following error:

Error reading drive: The parameter is incorrect.

I have tried this on both drives, both give the same error. Both have worked fine for over a year, but it was only today when I attempted to connect them at the same time that I ran into a problem - it will only recognize one of them. Whichever i connect first is the one it recognizes.

Both are 3/4 full, so reformatting to obtain a new Volume Serial Number is something I’d like to avoid.

PLUS…

I found another utility called Disk Serial Number Changer that has a nice Windows interface (no dropping to command prompt needed). When I used it, it comes back and gives the error that it can’t read the sector containing the Volume Serial Number. Once again I stress that these drives have never given me any trouble at all - so it’s unlikely there’s a hardware problem. What I suspect is that there is some kind of non-standard format applied to the drive. This causes me to worry that the drive would stop working if I DID go to the trouble of emptying one of them and reformatting it.

Does someone out there have the answer?

Hello there,

I have not tried this, lets see if another user can share some information or tips on this matter.

I did find the solution in another post here. It involves dropping to system prompt and issuing the command DISKPART. If I can insert this link correctly, the answer is found here:

Fixing Volume Serial Number problem using DISKPART

FYI - It works in Windows 8.1 was well - and probably in Windows 10.