I just replaced the optical drive of my PC with a caddy, why doesn't it detect it?

Quazar_omega

The model is Acer Aspire E 15 ( E5-573G-34PD ), I placed a Crucial SSD ( CT250MX500SSD1 ) in the caddy.

I tried looking in device management, it was under the drives, I tried to update the drivers but they were already up to date, so I looked again in file explorer and nothing.

I looked in computer management and it was there, it asked me to initialize it as GPT, I skipped it (maybe if I do it I'll see the drive) and I now see it listed as Disc1: 232,89 GB unallocated. I still can't see it in file explorer.

What should I do, initialize it?

William_mk2

Quazar_omega

Hi,

Kindly find the details below:

Solutions to Case 1 to Case 3 are based on the prerequisite for the SSD not showing up in File Explorer but you can find it in the Windows Disk Management

Case 1

SSD not showing up because the drive letter is missing or conflicting

In case the drive letter of the SSD is missing or conflicting with another disk, Windows OS will be unable to recognize it. It's fine because you can assign a new drive letter for the SSD in Windows Disk Management manually.

To assign a new drive letter, follow the steps: 

• Step 1: Right-click on This PC, select Manage. Under the Storage section, click Disk Management.
• Here's an alternative way to open Disk Management in Windows 10/8.1/8/7: press Windows + R keys and type diskmgmt.msc in the Run box, hit Enter.)
• Step 2: Right-click on the SSD partition and select Change Drive Letter and Paths….
• Step 3:Among Add, Change, and Remove, click the "Change" button, and then select a drive letter from the list. Click "OK" to assign a new drive letter to the SSD.
• 

Case 2

SSD not showing up because it is not initialized

If you get a new SSD and it won't show up in the Windows Explorer, it's likely in the "uninitialized" state. You must initialize a disk before Logical Disk Manager can access it.

Also, for an old SSD that shows the error 'disk unknown not initialized', the result is the same. In these two situations, to fix the problem, you can try to connect the SSD to the other working computer to check if it reports the same error. Otherwise, you need to initialize the SSD in Windows 10. 

To initialize an SSD, follow the steps:

• Step 1:Open Disk Management as taught. 
• Step 2:Find and right-click the SSD you want to initialize, and then click Initialize Disk.
• Step 3:In the Initialize Disk dialog box, select the disk(s) to initialize. You can select whether to use the master boot record (MBR) or GUID partition table (GPT) partition style.
• 

Case 3

SSD not showing up because the file system is not supported

If the above two methods do not work in your case, we need to think further. One presumption is that the file system has corrupted or Windows does not support the current file system.

As investigated, the relevant file system issues are mainly displayed as 'RAW', 'Free space' or 'Unallocated space'. To fix the file system issue, reformatting the disk would be enough.

As Disk formatting will completely erase data on it. 

Case 4

SSD not showing up because of disk driver issues

Just like a hard drive, most times the SSD is detected but not showing up in My Computer because the disk driver is not installed properly. So, you can try to reinstall the SSD driver to check if it can help to fix the issue. 

• Step 1:  Right-click on This PC, select Manage. Under the System Tools section, click Device Manager.
• Here's an alternative way to open Disk Management in Windows 10/8.1/8/7: press Windows + R keys and type devmgmt.msc in the Run box, hit Enter.
• Step 2: Go to Disk drives. It should list the storage devices that you have connected to your PC
• Step 3:Right-click the SSD and choose the third option "Uninstall".
• 

Remove the SSD and restart your system. Try to connect the SSD again to check if Windows 10 detects the SSD as normal.

If the comments are helpful, please click on "like"

If the comments resolves your issue, please click on "Yes"

William_mk2

Quazar_omega

Hi,

Kindly find the details below:

Solutions to Case 1 to Case 3 are based on the prerequisite for the SSD not showing up in File Explorer but you can find it in the Windows Disk Management

Case 1

SSD not showing up because the drive letter is missing or conflicting

In case the drive letter of the SSD is missing or conflicting with another disk, Windows OS will be unable to recognize it. It's fine because you can assign a new drive letter for the SSD in Windows Disk Management manually.

To assign a new drive letter, follow the steps: 

• Step 1: Right-click on This PC, select Manage. Under the Storage section, click Disk Management.
• Here's an alternative way to open Disk Management in Windows 10/8.1/8/7: press Windows + R keys and type diskmgmt.msc in the Run box, hit Enter.)
• Step 2: Right-click on the SSD partition and select Change Drive Letter and Paths….
• Step 3:Among Add, Change, and Remove, click the "Change" button, and then select a drive letter from the list. Click "OK" to assign a new drive letter to the SSD.
• 

Case 2

SSD not showing up because it is not initialized

If you get a new SSD and it won't show up in the Windows Explorer, it's likely in the "uninitialized" state. You must initialize a disk before Logical Disk Manager can access it.

Also, for an old SSD that shows the error 'disk unknown not initialized', the result is the same. In these two situations, to fix the problem, you can try to connect the SSD to the other working computer to check if it reports the same error. Otherwise, you need to initialize the SSD in Windows 10. 

To initialize an SSD, follow the steps:

• Step 1:Open Disk Management as taught. 
• Step 2:Find and right-click the SSD you want to initialize, and then click Initialize Disk.
• Step 3:In the Initialize Disk dialog box, select the disk(s) to initialize. You can select whether to use the master boot record (MBR) or GUID partition table (GPT) partition style.
• 

Case 3

SSD not showing up because the file system is not supported

If the above two methods do not work in your case, we need to think further. One presumption is that the file system has corrupted or Windows does not support the current file system.

As investigated, the relevant file system issues are mainly displayed as 'RAW', 'Free space' or 'Unallocated space'. To fix the file system issue, reformatting the disk would be enough.

As Disk formatting will completely erase data on it. 

Case 4

SSD not showing up because of disk driver issues

Just like a hard drive, most times the SSD is detected but not showing up in My Computer because the disk driver is not installed properly. So, you can try to reinstall the SSD driver to check if it can help to fix the issue. 

• Step 1:  Right-click on This PC, select Manage. Under the System Tools section, click Device Manager.
• Here's an alternative way to open Disk Management in Windows 10/8.1/8/7: press Windows + R keys and type devmgmt.msc in the Run box, hit Enter.
• Step 2: Go to Disk drives. It should list the storage devices that you have connected to your PC
• Step 3:Right-click the SSD and choose the third option "Uninstall".
• 

Remove the SSD and restart your system. Try to connect the SSD again to check if Windows 10 detects the SSD as normal.

If the comments are helpful, please click on "like"

If the comments resolves your issue, please click on "Yes"

Quazar_omega

Thanks, I initialized it, at first it wasn't there in file explorer but then I formatted it with a file system (in my case NTFS) and it work fine! Really helpful!