My Macbook pro A1708 running osx Monterey no longer detects disks and USB keys.

[rtt69]

Hello and best wishes for 2025 to everyone.

My Macbook pro A1708 running osx Monterey no longer detects disks and USB keys. When you plug it in, the lights come on but nothing appears on the desktop or in the disk manager. I reset the PRAM and SMC but nothing changes. In the disk manager I ran the main hard drive through the SOS "reel" to find errors, but nothing. I tried to reinstall Monterey with the recovery partition (Command + R) but I immediately get an error and it won't start. So I no longer have a way to make backups (Timemachine or others). Would you please have any suggestions without losing my data? THANKS.

CB

 

[Fishrrman]

Does Monterey have the option in "Privacy and Security" that you have to choose so that external devices will be mounted on the desktop? (can't remember)

One other thing to check (one never knows):
In the finder, choose settings and make sure you have the option checked to show drives, etc., on the desktop...

 

[bzgnyc2]

Hello and best wishes for 2025 to everyone.

My Macbook pro A1708 running osx Monterey no longer detects disks and USB keys. When you plug it in, the lights come on but nothing appears on the desktop or in the disk manager. I reset the PRAM and SMC but nothing changes. In the disk manager I ran the main hard drive through the SOS "reel" to find errors, but nothing. I tried to reinstall Monterey with the recovery partition (Command + R) but I immediately get an error and it won't start. So I no longer have a way to make backups (Timemachine or others). Would you please have any suggestions without losing my data? THANKS.

CB

Happy New York CB,

Quick clarification on your problem -- does everything work normally except you can't access external disks?

If so, two additional pieces of information helpful:
-What does Disk Utility show when you plug in an external disk? (also enable View -> Show All Devices)
-What shows up under USB (or Thunderbolt if your other disks are such) in System Informtion/Report? (plug the disk in first before going to that screen or refresh once you are there)