How to Perform External Hard Drive Data Recovery [Windows & Mac]

An external hard drive, also known as an external hard disk, is a vast storage device for both Windows and Mac users to transfer files, save big data, or create backups of precious personal data items. Like other types of storage devices, it's also prone to losing data due to various reasons.

On this page, we'll introduce reliable external hard drive recovery solutions and guide you in picking the proper method to recover data from an external hard drive, even if your device does not recognize the external hard drive or is physically damaged.

Common External Hard Drive Data Loss Scenarios

Here are common data loss situations that occur on an external hard drive; most of the data loss scenarios here are recoverable.

🗑️Human Error: Accidental file deletion or formatting can be an external hard drive's most common data loss scenario. You can connect your hard drive to your computer and run the data recovery software.	💡Solutions:  #1. data recovery tool #2. CMD #3. data recovery services	Recovery Difficulty: ⭐⭐
🗂️Logical Failure: If you find that some files on the external disks are not accessible or not showing up, you may encounter logical errors, which may be caused by critical file system structure loss or corruption.	💡Solutions:  #1. data recovery tools #2. data recovery services	Recovery Difficulty: ⭐⭐⭐
💾Wrongly Formatted: Sometimes, a wrongly formatted external hard disk or a loose connection may cause your external hard disk to not be detected, which could indicate that your motherboard and external hard drive are incompatible.	💡Solutions:  #1. data recovery tools #2. data recovery services	Recovery Difficulty: ⭐⭐⭐
🦠Malware or Viruses Infection: Some viruses may delete or damage data on the external hard drive. You need to clean the viruses with software and recover lost data.	💡Solutions:  #1. data recovery tools #2. data recovery services	Recovery Difficulty: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
🔨Physical Damage: When your external drive has suffered severe physical damage, you can usually tell from the outside - common things include clicking noises and an indicator that doesn't light up.	💡Solution:  #1. physically damaged hard drive recovery	Difficulty: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

How to Recover Data from an External Hard Drive in 3 Ways

To find the right external hard disk recovery solution, learning what causes file loss on your device is essential. Read on to learn how to recover data from an external hard drive in 3 effective ways: using data recovery tools (most recommended!), CMD command lines, and data recovery services.

Method 1. Recover Data from External Hard Drive with Data Recovery Software

✅Applies to Scan and recover data from external hard drives due to deleting, formatting, RAW, OS crash, power failure, partition loss, hidden files, etc., errors.

1️⃣EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard

When you lose files on an external hard drive, the easiest way to recover data from an external hard drive is to turn to the best data recovery software for Windows for help. Professional hard drive recovery software - EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard can help.

This external hard drive recovery software supports restoring data from an external hard drive lost due to accidentally formatting, deleting data, virus attack, or other reasons on all brands of devices, such as Buffalo, WD, Seagate, Toshiba, Samsung, Lacie, Silicon, ADATA, and more. Watch the video guide for external hard drive data recovery:

• 00:34 Why Can Recover Deleted Files
• 01:13 Delete Files from External Hard Drive
• 03:06 Try Data Recovery Service

Follow the 3-step tutorial below to recover deleted files from an external hard drive immediately:

Step 1. Choose and scan the external hard drive

• Download and install EaseUS Data Recovery on your PC or laptop. 
• Connect the external hard drive to your computer.
• Run EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard and choose the external drive from External drives list. Then, click "Search for Lost Data". 

Step 2. Check the scan results

• EaseUS data recovery software will immediately scan the selected drive for all data, including deleted, corrupted, and existing data.
• You can use the Filter feature to quickly locate the files of one kind, such as Pictures, Word, Excel, PDF, videos, emails, etc.

Step 3. Preview and recover data

• Double-clicking a file from the scanned results to preview.
• Choose the files you want and click "Recover".
• Select a different drive to save the recovered files instead of the original one.

💡Tip: You can restore data on the local disks, external hard drives, and also the cloud storage.

If you think EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard is applicable, you can recommend this hard drive repair software to more users and help them recover files from external hard drives.

2️⃣TestDisk

TsetDisk is a robust open-source data recovery tool that offers a solution to recover or retrieve unintentional deletions and hidden data. If you are very familiar with the command line, congratulations on finding the best external disk recovery method for you!

Here are steps to perform external hard drive recovery using TestDisk:

Step 1. Download and launch "TestDisk" on your Windows PC. Click the "Create" button and then press "Enter".

TestDisk will start scanning for all available hard disks.

Step 2. Choose the appropriate disk from the list using the arrow keys and select "Proceed".

Step 3. Select the Intel partition table type and click "Enter".

Step 4. Select "Analyze" and press "Enter" to begin analyzing the selected hard disk.

Step 5. After analyzing the disk, utilize the "Quick Search" option for lost data files.

Step 6. Go through the list of lost files, choose the ones you want to recover, and then hit "C" to copy them. Select the destination folder for copying, hit "Y" to begin, and wait for the "Copy Done!" message to appear.

3️⃣PhotoRec

PhotoRec is a powerful file recovery tool that can recover photographs and other files. Moreover, PhotoRec employs read-only access to ensure the safety of all recovery processes. Here are the steps you can refer to:

Step 1. Download and install PhotoRec when you are using the administrator account. Then, to select the disk you want to work with, use the Up/Down arrows. To proceed, press "Enter".

Step 2. Select "Search > data recovery" and press "Enter" to begin the file recovery procedure.

In order to recover lost files, PhotoRec requires knowledge of the file system type used to store the files. Choose Other if the file system is not ext2, ext3, or ext4.

Step 3. Select a location to save the recovered files using the Up/Down arrow keys. To begin recuperation, press "C".

If you think this post is informative, share it on your SNS to help others learn how to recover data from an external hard drive using these three effective hard drive recovery tools!

Method 2. Recover Data from an External Hard Drive via CMD

✅Applies to Restore lost files on the external hard disk by repairing external hard drives with CMD.

Sometimes, viruses or malware may cause external hard drive corruption and data loss. This method is to recover files from corrupted external hard drive. Be aware of typing the right command lines each time, as any false operation may cause serious problems.

You can use Windows CMD commands as linked and the steps below to restore external hard drive data now:

Step 1. Press the "Win + R" keys and type: cmd, hit "Enter" to open the Command Prompt window.

Step 2. Type the following command lines and hit Enter each time:

• chkdsk F: /f (Replace F with the drive letter of the external hard drive.)
• Y
• F
• F:\>attrib -h -r -s /s /d *.*

Step 3. Wait for the operation to complete and type exit to close the window.

After this, restart your computer and reconnect the external hard disk. You shall be able to view and check all data on the external hard drive. If the command prompt is not working on your computer, turn to Method 1 and use EaseUS data recovery software for help instead.

Check the following passage to recover files from corrupted hard drive with a more detailed tutorial:

Method 3. Apply External Hard Drive Data Recovery Services

✅Applies to: Recover lost external hard drive data and fix external hard drive issues.

After reading the first method, you should have recovered deleted files from the external hard disk corrupted. You may need to try an advanced method if you cannot complete external hard drive data recovery with data recovery software.

If you don't want to go outside or the local stores are not working hours, you can contact EaseUS data recovery services. Our professional recovery team will always be there to ask questions and fix all the data loss issues.

Recover Data from an External HDD Not Recognized by Your Computer

The above methods work when you want to recover deleted, formatted, and lost files from a workable external hard drive. Can you recover data from an external hard drive that is not recognized? In this section, we will discuss how to recover data from an external hard drive that is not recognized by your computer.

The external hard drive doesn't appear in File Explorer but is listed in Disk Management because it is a RAW drive and contains no partitions. So, first press "Windows Key + R" and type diskmgmt.msc into the Run dialog and press "Enter" to check if the drive shows up in Disk Management.

If you see the hard disk here, you can first perform hard drive recovery to restore data from the not-detecting disk using the EaseUS hard drive recovery software.

Then, you can fix the external hard drive that can be recognized without data loss! Here are the fixes:

1. Fix 1. Assign a new hard drive letter to the external hard drive
2. Fix 2. Re-format the external hard drive to NTFS
3. Fix 3. Update Diver in Disk Manager

Recover Data from Physically Damaged External Hard Drive

Is it possible to recover data from a damaged external hard drive? The answer is yes; the difficulty of data recovery depends on the extent of the damage to the external drive. Data recovery tools can often access the data by navigating the complexities of the corrupted file system on the damaged hard drive and recovering its stored files.

Download the EaseUS data recovery tool, one of the best hard drive recovery products on the market, to maximize the recovery of data stored on your damaged external hard drive.

But if your external hard disk is completely damaged and unusable. It is difficult to recover the data saved on it, you can send the damaged drive to the official support, to try to repair it. But in most cases, you have to give up stored data on the damaged external hard drive and replace it with a new one.

Extra Tip: Protect External Hard Drive Data and Avoid Data Loss

After trying the above solutions, you should be able to view and use your external hard drive data again. In order to protect your external hard drive data and avoid further data loss, we have collected some tips for you.

Format an External Hard Drive to be Usable Again

It's important that you make sure the external hard drive is ready and safe for storing data again. So, don't rush to save the restored files back on your device. Format it first.

Step 1. Connect the external hard drive to the PC and open File Explorer.

Step 2. Right-click the external hard drive and select the "Format" option.

Step 3. On the format window, select the NTFS option and tick "Quick Format". Click "Start".

After this, save your files back to your external hard drive again.

Reinstall Drivers for Unrecognized External Hard Drive

If the driver update doesn't work, the external hard drive driver may be corrupt or damaged. Hence, you need to reinstall the external HDD driver. Here are the steps:

• Go to Device Manager by pressing the Windows Key + R.
• Select Disk drives and find your external hard disk.
• Right-click on it and choose Uninstall device.
• In the Uninstall device window, click "Uninstall" to continue.

• Restart your computer, and reinstall the hard drive driver.
• Check if the external hard drive can be shown in Disk Management.

External Hard Drive Recovery on Mac

For Mac users, the best option is to acquire a competent Mac external hard drive data recovery tool and carry out data recovery as quickly as possible if you are unable to access or identify files in the trash or backup, or even if no backups were ever made.

A reputable data recovery tool for Mac is EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac. About the more than ten years of experience, the deep scan capability, and the compatibility with all versions of macOS and Mac OS X, including the most recent macOS Sonoma. It's the best option if you're having problems recovering your Mac's data and are looking for a straightforward yet efficient solution.

Don't hesitate to share these useful tips to help more users avoid data loss on the external hard drive.

To Sum Up

On this page, we explained what an external hard drive is and the normal causes of file loss errors on external hard drives, and we also collected 4 reliable solutions to help you effectively recover data from external hard drives with ease.

In addition to the four methods above, we also offer 3 tips to help you protect your disk files safely. Also, don't forget to turn to EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for help whenever you lose files on your external hard drive, internal HDD/SSD, USB, etc., devices.

It's a wise choice for you to equip your computer with such a powerful tool, which will help you retrieve your lost data as soon as possible and minimize your loss.

FAQs About External Hard Drive Recovery

Common data loss scenarios are relatively easy to handle, and EaseUS hard drive data recovery software can help recover 99% of deleted and lost data from an external hard disk. However, there are still some concerns from people that this article may not cover. For example:

1. How much does it cost to recover data from an external hard drive?

Usually, the price for such recovery varies from $500 to $1000. If the drive isn't physically damaged but there is a logical error, you can try a DIY approach by using data recovery software like EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard. The price to recover data from external hard drives using EaseUS software is much lower than the manual data recovery service.

For more information, follow to learn more about hard drive recovery costs.

2. How can I recover data from an external hard drive not recognized?

First, connect your external hard drive to another computer and test if it is a USB port problem. If it works on another computer, you should fix the USB port. Otherwise, check the external hard drive connection in Disk Management, and use EaseUS Data Recovery Wizar to recover data from the not recognized external hard drive.

3. Can you retrieve data from a dead external hard drive?

Yes, you can easily recover data from a dead hard drive by using EaseUS bootable data recovery software. By creating a bootable USB, CD/DVD, you can boot your computer normally and perform the USB recovery tool in three steps.