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Unable to open a G Drive mobile USB

Anonymous
2020-04-26T13:51:06+00:00

I recently bought a DELL Inspiron laptop uses Microsoft, having used Apple for years. I have a G DRIVE (G Technology) mobile USB, when I plugged it into my old laptop, a window appeared allowing me to open it. I've plugged it into my DELL laptop and nothing happens, I can find it in Devices but I can't open it. I save all my photos onto this drive and need to save some more. Please tell me how to open it. Thank you.

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Devices and drivers

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  1. Virginia M 40,820 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2020-04-26T14:00:31+00:00

    Hello, I’m Virginia an independent advisor with 20 years of expertise in fixing my own & friends’ PC problems.

    Which Windows version are you running - 1809, 1903 or 1909?

    Was the drive connected to a Mac computer previously?

    It may be a case that the drive’s file format isn’t PC compatible so would require formatting to be able to be read, however this would mean losing all the files so isn’t an option yet.

    Does the drive have a letter assigned? If not the do this via drive management.

    Do you still have to old laptop? Is it Windows or Mac? If Windows then you can copy all the files from the drive to the laptop, then plug the drive in to the new Dell & clean it via diskpart:

    Open powershell with admin & enter:

    Diskpart

    List disk

    Select disk X (where X is the drive number shown under list disk)

    Clean

    Now you can close Powershell.

    Go to disk management & it will ask you to initialise the drive - allow this, not you can format the drive & it should be viewable.

    Now you can connect it to the old PC & transfer all your files back to the drive.

    3 people found this answer helpful.
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  2. Virginia M 40,820 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2020-04-27T11:05:50+00:00

    Thanks, yes PC = Windows.

    The latest Windows version is 1909.

    Macs use a different file system to Windows & therefore not interchangeable afaik.

    On the Windows PC open Computer with the drive attached, does it show a drive letter - D, E etc?

    Also check under drive management & see if the drive is shown.

    If there’s no drive letter then it’ll not appear.

    1 person found this answer helpful.
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  3. Anonymous
    2020-04-27T08:00:22+00:00

    Hi Virginia, thank you for replying. First you need to know that I’m not a computer whizz & don’t know all the jargon!

    It’s version 1903.

    yes it was connected to my Apple laptop before but only when i wanted to save photos, it was permanently connected.

    To me, PC means personal computer ie my laptop, which it worked with before so presumably the file format is PC compatible?

    i don’t understand what you mean about does the drive have a letter assigned.

    The old laptop was mac but i don’t have it available at the moment.

    1 person found this answer helpful.
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  4. Virginia M 40,820 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2020-04-28T12:00:56+00:00

    It’s quite easy to add a drive letter:

    https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/79064-chang...

    If you’d still prefer to use a new drive then that’s OK. :)

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  5. Anonymous
    2020-04-28T07:05:44+00:00

    Theres no drive letter. I think it’ll be easiest to save my latest photos to a new hard drive.

    thanks for your help.

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