External drives · Setting up your drive

Why doesn't my external drive appear in Storage Studio's drive list?

Short answer: Storage Studio lists drives macOS has mounted. Make sure the drive shows in Finder under Locations (try another port or cable, or format it in Disk Utility if it's new), then refresh. Time Machine volumes are hidden on purpose.

Storage Studio lists drives that macOS has mounted, so start there:

  1. Check the drive appears in Finder's sidebar under Locations. If it doesn't, macOS hasn't mounted it — try another port or cable, or open Disk Utility to see whether it needs to be formatted or mounted.
  2. Brand-new drives sometimes arrive unformatted; erase it as APFS in Disk Utility.
  3. Time Machine backup volumes are deliberately hidden from the list.
  4. Click Refresh (or close and reopen the window) after plugging the drive in.

If the drive shows in Finder but not in the list, open Inspect fast drive to check what Storage Studio sees.

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