Someone gave me a wd external hard drive. Computer says device is ready for use. Drive is found in device manager but no letter is assigned. All it shows is wd external usb device.

Assign a drive letter for the External drive.

• Right Click on My Computer
• Scroll to Manage
• Select Disk Management
• Locate the External drive in the lower bottom Right corner, Right Click, Select Assign Drive Letter. Ok/Close

Open up My Computer, and you should see your External drive with your new drive letter assigned to it.

Hello there,

Please try to plug it into another USB port. There is a chance that your port could be faulty. If its not with the port, try to assign the drive letter if you are using windows. You have to right click on the My Computer icon, select Manage. Once on Computer Management, select Disk Management. Locate your WD drive and right click again. Finally, click on the Assign Drive Letter and follow the wizard.

Good luck!

You might just need to assign a drive letter to it. Although this is generally automatic, something may have happened to cause it to lose it's format or drive letter. Check out the below link. I am pretty confident this will fix your problem.

http://www.online-tech-tips.com/computer-tips/how-to-change-the-drive-letter-in-windows-xp-for-an-external-usb-stick-or-hard-drive/

This usually means, that the system cannot assign a drive letter to it.

You have to find Disk Management under Administrative Tools.

In Windows XP you right-click My Computer, choose Manage, management console opens, and Disk Management is available in the tree on the left somewhere near the end.
You should plug in one of the HDDs - a new drive should appear there on the right, when you click the "Refresh" icon. Right click on this drive and select "Assign/change drive letter", and choose a drive letter, preferrably more towards the end of the alphabet (like W for example). When you are done the drive should appear on the list with the letter W, and you should be able to use it.
Do the same with the other drive, assigning a different letter (like V for example).

It could be that the OS is not assigning a drive letter to your removable drive. To do this, go to disk management and assign one.

Assuming OS is Win 2000/XP/Vista

Right-click My Computer then Manage
Click on Disk Management
Right-click the removable drive and click on Change Drive Letter
Assign a drive letter and click OK
Your drive should now show up on My Computer

Hope this helps.

If your PC will recognize the drive and give it a drive letter, you can run chkdsk (Check Disk) from the Run prompt to verify that the drive does not have damaged sectors. many times chkdsk will fix minor errors allowing you to access the drive again.
Click Start, Run CMD, enter, then type: X: (X being the drive letter of the Seagate) then type chkdsk /r and hit enter. If it completes 100% try accessing the drive again.
If you cannot acquire a drive Letter when you plug in the WD External try going to Disk Management and assigning a drive letter.
Click Start, then Right click on My Computer and click Manage, then click Disk Management. See if your WD drive shows up in the list. If it does, right click on the larger box on the right and see if it will allow you to assign a drive letter.

Another option you may have is taking the hard drive out of the WD External enclosure and either connecting it as a secondary drive in a desktop PC, or installing it into another external enclsure USB device, and try again to access the drive.

If none of these options work, your last option is to contract a Disk Recovery Service to acquire your data. They are usually very expensive.

If your laptop will give your WD a drive letter, you can run chkdsk (Check Disk) from the Run prompt to verify that the drive does not have damaged sectors. many times chkdsk will fix minor errors allowing you to access the drive again.
Click Start, Run CMD, enter, then type: X: (X being the drive letter of the Seagate) then type chkdsk /r and hit enter. If it completes 100% try accessing the drive again.
If you cannot acquire a drive Letter when you plug in the WD drive, try going to Disk Management and assigning a drive letter.
Click Start, then Right click on My Computer and click Manage, then click Disk Management. See if your WD drive shows up in the list. If it does, right click on the larger box on the right and see if it will allow you to assign a drive letter.

Another option you may have is taking the hard drive out of the WD enclosure and either connecting it as a secondary drive in a desktop PC, or installing it into another external enclsure USB device, and try again to access the drive.

If none of these options work, your last option is to contract a Disk Recovery Service to acquire your data. They are usually very expensive.

When remove the drive do this steps properly first when you want remove the drive remove safley than remive it

I HAVE SOLVED THE PROBLEM! or at least this works for my my book 1tb external hard drive. when i initially connect it i get the 'new device detected' pop up thing, but then it doesn't show on my computer. However, I have found that keeping the device pllugged into the computer but removing then replacing the power source from the device causes it to show up. That's all I did, unplug the power cord on the back and replace it. The computer says 'new hardware detected' and 'found my book mass storage device,' then it appears on my my computer tab. Hope this works with you as well!

Have you tried in Disk Management Right-Clicking on the drive and selecting 'Change Drive Letter and Paths...' ? That is the normal way to change or add a drive letter to any drive, internally or externally attached (other than by network connection)?