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hamishmclaren

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 2, 2016
2
0
In disk utility it says they are internal hard disks. I have to check the box "Hard disks" in the finder preferences in order for them to show up on the desktop. When on the desktop they have the same icon as the "Macintosh HD" Hard disk instead of the orange external hard drive icon. How can I change them back to normal external hard drives?
 
Do you have a USB3 hub connected?

If the answer is yes, what happens when you REMOVE the USB3 hub, and connect the drives directly to the Mac's USB ports?
 
Yes I am using a USB3 hub. When I connect the drives directly to the mac they appear normally as external hard drives. Thanks for suggesting this, I never thought about the hub. Do you know why the hub causes this?
 
"Do you know why the hub causes this?"

I would -guess- that there is some kind of incompatibility or conflict between the Mac's USB controller and the hub's controller.

If this really bothers you, you might try a different USB3 hub.

But, I will take -another- guess, and speculate that aside from the fact that things don't "report right" in disk utility, you can just keep using the hub you have now, without problems...
 
Just for the record, my external USB HDD is connected via the built-int USB3 hub in my Dell U2713HM monitor and does not exhibit the problem you described.
 
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