Disk issues?

Hey there.
So, I’ve got two drives here. One is split into two partitions—a 110GB one and a 40GB one—and then there's this other 500GB drive...
The thing is, I can see that 500GB drive sitting there in My Computer, but whenever I try to actually open it... nothing. It just won't budge.
It keeps giving me a "not responding" error message.
Does anyone know how I can actually bring this drive back to life?

So, tell me about that drive:
- Is it brand new?
- Did you go into Disk Management and actually assign it a drive letter?
- Does it have a partition set up yet?
- Is it formatted as NTFS or FAT32?

wearymason4 said:so, tell me about this drive:
- is it brand new?
- is it initialized in "Disk Management" and assigned a drive letter?
- does it actually have a partition?
- is it formatted as NTFS or FAT32?

It’s definitely not new...
I had it plugged into my PC, and when I finally got back from working out in the field yesterday—after being away for maybe a month or so...
I see the drive shows up, but I can't actually open it...
No partition, and if my memory serves me right, it was formatted as NTFS...

There's just not enough info here to really call it, and honestly, the data you're giving me feels a bit off—if it's formatted as NTFS, then we already know there's a partition involved.
There could be a bunch of different things going on... it's possible the drive was used with macOS or Linux, so the hardware is perfectly fine, but Windows is just being stubborn and won't let you in.

wearymason4 said:You’re giving me shaky data here, and honestly, your premise is flawed. If you're claiming it's NTFS, then by definition there's a partition involved.
There are several ways this could play out... maybe the drive was formatted for macOS, Linux, or something else entirely. The hardware itself might be perfectly fine, but Windows just refuses to recognize it.

Is it actually possible that this drive was running fine on Linux or macOS for months, and then suddenly, out of nowhere, Windows decides it’s no longer compatible?

It isn't showing up as NTFS; it's being flagged as RAW...
Now I'm stuck trying to figure out how to convert it back to NTFS without wiping everything...

How does a drive work perfectly for months and then suddenly go RAW and stop responding?

Just Google "RAW to NTFS" and you'll find plenty of YouTube tutorials and sites where you can grab software to fix it.
I haven't dealt with this specific mess myself, but I've seen people talking about different fixes on tech forums. Honestly, I'm still scratching my head over what actually causes this to happen in the first place.