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External hard drive is showing as being not formatted

We may see the external hard disk drive is not formatted message when double click its icon. Do you know what is going on at that time? What we can do if want to read files or folders saved on the portable hard disk at the previous time? Generally speaking, we can not open the external hard drive until format it, so it seems that we can not access those original contents on the external drive. But as a matter of fact, we can try to restore the old files from the unformatted external hard drive to view them.

Example of external hard disk drive showing not formatted

I was told that the external hard drive on which I have stored a lot of files and folders important is not formatted when I connected it to my computer. As a result, I could not open the portable hard disk drive to view its original data or save new contents on it. I felt anxious because I have to read some files on the external hard drive urgently. Is there nay way for me to access those previous contents when the portable hard drive is in not formatted trouble? Help me, please. -Cobber from LA

How to retrieve files form the unformatted external hard disk with data recovery software

We can try to use the data recovery software to get the original information back from the external hard drive which is not formatted. It is easy and simple to use the data recovery tool, actually. The following steps can help us know better about not formatted external hard drive files recovery with data recovery program:

Recover files from external hard drive

Preparation: Download the data recovery software and connect the external hard drive. Install it properly and launch the software. Finally, you can select a recovery module.

1Download the data recovery software and install it on the computer.
2Plug the unformatted external hard drive into the computer on which the data recovery tool mounted.
3Run the data restoration program on the computer and choose the recovery model and aim disk to scan.
4Preview the contents in the list after the scan and then pick up the information needed to recover.

Notices should be took of while recovering data from external hdd unformat

Nearly all of us have the ability to perform data recovery when external hard drive not formatted, because it is really easy and simple to use the data recovery program. What's more, we do not need to be a professional computer or data engineer or be good at files recovery to perform it according to steps above. But we may fail to get files wanted back, either. The reasons of failure may be incorrect actions we performed on the unformatted external hard drive. Here are some tips we should keep in mind as follows:

1. Do not format the external hard drive at once. We would be asked that do you want to format it now after being told disk is not formatted information. Generally speaking, there would be format and cancel two options at that moment. Some of us may tend to click on the format button immediately to use the portable hard disk drive normally as soon as possible. We should better perform files recovery at first and then format it if the original data on the external hard drive is useful.

2. Do not use the problematic portable hard disk drive temporarily. It is better not to use the external hard drive if we have no idea how to access the information saved on it at the previous time. There would be corruption or other harmful events happen to the unformatted external hard drive and cause the failure of data recovery. So we can plug the not formatted external hard drive out of computer at that time.

3. Do not CHKDSK when the external hard disk drive is not formatted. Some of us want to know the reason that portable hard disk drive turn to not formatted situation, so we tend to perform CHKDSK operation on the questionable external hard drive. We have talked that not use the problematic portable hard drive until the end of files recovery, so it is better not CHKDSK at that moment.

4. Other tips to get lost files back while external hard drive showing not formatted error.

File types can be restored from the portable hard drive not formatted

We can store various types of files on the external hard drive, such as videos, pictures, audios, word documents, power point files, and so forth. As the same, we may be able to recover all of them from the portable hard disk drive with data recovery tool if it shows not formatted problem.

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