Faced with such a problem: when I connect any external removable USB HDD or flash drive, Windows doesn’t assign a drive letter to it. When a drive is connected, a message appears indicating that a new device is installed, the drive appears in the Device Manager, but is not displayed in the File Explorer.
To make the drive available in the system, you must assign a drive letter through the Disk Management console each time manually. To do this, open the Computer Management console (via the Win + X menu) and go to the Storage section -> Disk management. In the list of drives, locate the connected removable USB drive. As you can see, the disk is online, it has one healthy partition with the NTFS, but it is not assigned with a drive letter. To assign a drive letter to it, right-click on the partition and select “Change Drive Letter and Path“.
In the window that appears, click the “Add” button, select “Assign the following drive letter” and select the letter you want to assign to the drive (for example, H: ) in the drop-down list and click OK.
After that, the connected USB drive appears in the File Explorer with the assigned drive letter. However, after disconnecting the USB device or restarting the computer, the drive letter won’t be assigned automatically to it. I have to assign the letter again manually through Disk Management, and that becomes annoying.
It seems that some feature of automatic detection of partitions on the external hard disks fails. How to solve this problem?
First of all, make sure that the Virtual Disk service is running. You can check the status of this service in the services management console (services.msc).
Or from the command prompt:
sc query vds |
SERVICE_NAME: vds
TYPE : 10 WIN32_OWN_PROCESS
STATE : 1 STOPPED
WIN32_EXIT_CODE : 0 (0x0)
SERVICE_EXIT_CODE : 0 (0x0)
CHECKPOINT : 0x0
WAIT_HINT : 0x0
If the service is stopped, start it from the graphical snap-in (Start button) or using the command:
net start vds |
Check if the problem persists. If it does, make sure that the automatic mounting of new volumes is enabled.
Open the command prompt as administrator and run the following commands:
diskpart |
Within diskpart, make sure that the automatic mounting of new volumes is enabled:
DISKPART> automount |
Automatic mounting of new volumes disabled.
As you can see, the auto-mounting is disabled. Let’s enable it:
DISKPART> automount enable |
Automatic mounting of new volumes enabled.
Exit diskpart
DISKPART> exit |
Leaving DiskPart...
DISKPART>automount scrub Restart your computer and verify if the letters are assigned to the external USB drives.
If not, check if the “hidden” and “do not assign a drive letter” attributes are set for the partition on the USB drive. Run the Diskpart command line and enter the following commands:
- List the disks:
list disk - Find the disk number assigned to your USB flash drive (in this example 1) and select it:
select disk 1 - List the partitions on the disk:
list part - Select the desired partition:
select partition 2 - Check the partition attributes:
attributes volume - As you can see, the “Hidden” and “No Default Drive Letter” attributes are enabled for this volume;
- Disable these attributes with commands:
attributes volume clear NoDefaultDriveLetter
attributes volume clear hidden
Volume attributes cleared successfully
- End the diskpart session by typing:
exit
After that, this partition on the USB flash drive should automatically be assigned a drive letter on any computer.
Also keep in mind that if there are several partitions on the USB flash drive, then Windows will only see the first partition. The ability to create multiple partitions on removable USB drives appeared only in Windows 10 1703. Previously, in order to make second and subsequent partitions on the USB flash drive were accessible in Windows, you had to use a trick to make Windows recognize USB flash drive as a HDD). If your USB flash drive doesn’t appear in the Disk Management console, try using a different USB port, cable. Try to connect the USB flash drive directly to the computer (without the USB hub), check whether the power is on, and whether it is recognized on other computers.
23 comments
Thanks, this worked great!
Finnally something that worked. 4 of my 9 USB keys no longer mount on my computer but worked on my wife’s so I knew it was a Windows problem. Gave up a year ago trying to solve the problem because none of the solutions on the web worked – and there are tons of them. So after loading Win 10 thought I would see if my keys worked they still didn’t so I did a google and this solution pooped up.
This fix worked like charm. Thanks for posting friend.
Great help! Thank a lot!
Very helpful! Thank you very much!
You rock!!!! Been fighting this on a SBS 2011 server. Enabling automount did the trick.
Thanks SO much!!
Well done – automount worked like a dream in Windows10 Anniversary edition (on my laptop). Many thanks.
Good Job. Thank you verry much.
Virtual Disk service is running
aoutomount is anabled already
disk drive is showing in device manger
but drives still not shown in my computer
win 7 ultimate service pack 1 fully updated
plz help
Thank you!
I had exact problem and this solution helped me.
Thanks a lot!
It solved my problem!
every thing checked and correct but nothing is working for me
windows 10 64 bit pro
and USB flash drive is 16 GB Sandisk 3.0
And USB Drive is showing in Disk Management with its full capacity.
After reinstalling Windows my Data disk for some reason became hidden.. I couldnt figure out why it wouldnt auto mount but this solved it. Literally the only page on the internet that had the solution thanks fellas 🙂
Thank you, mine was fixed in diskpart
Thank you very much! I resolved my issue by setting the attribute of my disk. Thanks!!!
Thanks for the post, the part about the hidden drive attribute helped. No idea how it got set to Yes but I cleared it and it mounts fine again.
Thank you very much!. I was also able to resolve this by changing attributes of the external SSD.
Thank you very much. It solved my issues with the windows media creation tool
Excelent way of dealing with this issue!, Thank you very much!
Thanks, It’s working! It solved my problem!
Widows is the stupidest OS I have ever used. (For some reason I have to use it sometimes.) I formatted a brand new SSD on Windows (NTFS). Then I used this SSD on my Linux Mint without any problem for weeks. My colleague copied some data from it to his MAC. There were no problems. And now I plugged in again to that Windows shit, and it sees RAW fs. Why anybody pays a dollar for this OS, I really do not understand.
Great article! But all the measures above were fine and not the problem with my USB, a S$47 SanDisk 64GB stick (bought in Singapore but no warranty as I don’t live in Singapore and can’t get there at the moment….) My problem was that it just wouldn’t assign a drive letter. I was about to throw it in the bin. It said Healthy in Disk Management, you just couldn’t browse it. I assigned a drive letter and then the stick immediately opened in File Explorer. I restarted the computer, plugged in the stick and it again automatically recognised!