WD elements recognized in Chrome but no longer in Windows

Hello,
My WD elements portable hard drive has stopped being recognized in Windows. When I plug it in, it does not show up and more. I tried it on my Chromebook and everything is still there. Does anyone have a suggestion as to how I can get access to my files in Windows without erasing everything?

What filesystem are you using? Did you try running CHKDSK to check the drive for errors?

The possible causes for such an issue can be an incompatible file system, missing drive letter, disk driver issues, damaged partition issues on the hard drive. In a worst-case, the drive itself is failing.

You can try below fixes to resolve the issue:

  1. Initialize the drive or drive partition
  2. Change/Assign drive letter
  3. Update Disk drivers
  4. Enable drive in BIOS

Hope it helps!

chkdsk is a bad idea, if it was even an option.

You may be on the right track with the file system not being supported in Windows…though, it is possible that there are just bad sectors in the file tables that ChromeOS isn’t getting stuck on.

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Do you even think before you post your advice? You, once again, are telling the user to initialize their drive (overwriting and causing more data loss) in an attempt to troubleshoot an issue.

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I can’t run CHKDSK if the hard drive is not recognized in Windows File explorer.

Thank you

Thank you. I can’t do any of the suggested things because the drive is not recognized in Windows file explorer.

Thanks for your response. I only ever used the hard drive in Windows. I never changed anything with it. It stopped being recognized so I thought I’d give it a shot with my Chromebook. I’m guessing I’m screwed unless I can figure a way to transfer all the data through my chromebook onto a different hard drive. I’ve always used WD drives but will have to try Toshiba now.

Thank you for your response. Sadly, I can’t do any of these things since it’s not recognized in Windows when plugged in.