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SSD is much faster than HDD and of course it is more expensive. It may become a disaster when you find your SSD is not showing up on your computer, therefore, you need effective solution to help you fix this issue. In this article, we will show you how to fix 'SSD Not Showing Up or Not Detected on Windows' issue and help you recover lost data from unrecognized, formatted or inaccessible SSD with Do Your Data Recovery software.

There are many reasons behind SSD not showing up on your computer. Fortunately, you can find some solutions to help you fix this kind of issue in different situations.

Best 6 methods to fix 'SSD Not Showing up on Windows' issue

Reasons Solutions
1. No drive letter assigned to the SSD or drive letter conflict. Assign a new drive letter to the SSD...Full steps
2. SSD is shown as unallocated in Disk Management. Create a new volume on the SSD...Full steps
3. File system on the SSD gets corrupted, file system is incompatible, SSD is infected by virus or malware. Format the SSD...Full steps
4. SSD is not initialized. Initialize the SSD...Full steps
5. SSD driver issue. Update storage controller driver...Full steps
6. Operating system does not allow to show SSD. Verify that SSD shows up in BIOS...Full steps

1. Fix 'no drive latter assigned to the SSD'.

In some cases, your SSD has been recognized by your computer, but it is not showing up in File Explorer because it does not have a right drive letter. Just assign a new drive letter to the SSD to solve this issue.

Right-click on "This PC", select "Manage". Under the Storage section, click "Disk Management". Then you have opened Disk Management, and find the SSD. Right-click the SSD, choose ‘’Change Drive Letter and Paths...”, then assign a new drive letter to the SSD. After that, you will see the SSD in File Explorer (under This PC).

assign new drive letter to SSD

2. Create new volume on SSD.

If you see the SSD is shown as Unallocated in Disk Management, just create a new volume on the SSD. Very simple. Open Disk Management > Right-click on the unallocated space and click New Simple Volume > Follow the wizard to create a new volume on the SSD.

create a new volume on SSD

3. Format the SSD if the file system gets corrupted or the SSD gets attacked by virus.

If the file system on the SSD gets corrupted, the SSD is infected by virus files, or the file system is incompatible with Windows, just format it. Open Disk Management, right-click the SSD and choose Format.

format SSD

4. Initialize the SSD so that it can be used.

If the SSD shows error 'disk unknown not initialized', you can initialize this SSD so that it can be used on your computer.

initialize SSD

5. SSD is not showing up due to outdated driver.

Corrupt, outdated, or incompatible storage controller driver may also lead to SSD not showing up. Try updating your device drivers to fix the ‘SSD Not Showing Up’ problem. To do so, follow these steps:

Step 1. Press Windows + X, click Device Manager from available options to open it.

Step 2. Find the storage controllers, expand the controller’s category, and right-click on the controller driver to update.

Step 3. Click Update driver to proceed.

update driver for SSD

In some cases, you need to install special drivers for your SSD.

6. Fix 'operating system does not allow to show SSD'.

When you are facing a ‘New SSD Not Showing Up’ error while connecting the SSD drive and trying to access it, you should check if your OS identifies your SSD by opening the BIOS menu and verifying that it shows in BIOS. Follow the steps below:

Step 1. Reboot it while restarting the PC and press the BIOS key (Usually F8, F10, F2, or F12.) to enter the BIOS menu. (Refer to the manufacturer of your device if these keys don’t open the BIOS menu.)

Step 2. If you can see the SSD in the BIOS menu listed with other devices, the system recognizes the SSD.

However, as the system doesn't show the SSD in normal mode, you may need to reinstall the entire Windows on your system to fix the problem.

Related article: solve ‘external hard drive including portable SSD is not showing up on Windows computer’.
Related article: solve ‘external hard drive including portable SSD is not showing up on Mac’.

Recover data from unrecognized, formatted, initialized or damaged SSD

Whether you have formatted/initialized your SSD or not, you can recover all your data from the SSD.

Follow the steps below to get lost data back.

Step 1. Download and install a data recovery program - Do Your Data Recovery on your computer.

Step 2. Select the SSD to start data recovery.

Recover lost data from SSD

Step 3. Scan the SSD to find all existing and lost data.

Recover lost data from SSD

Step 4. Recover lost data once the scan is completed.

Recover lost data from SSD

Repair unrecognized SSD with DoYourData Super Eraser

DoYourData Super Eraser is a certified data erasure software. It offers disk repair tool to help you fix minor errors on the SSD. Follow the steps below.

Step 1. Download and install DoYourData Super Eraser on your computer. Then open it.

Step 2. Make sure your SSD is connected to your computer, and run DoYourData Super Eraser on your computer. Choose tool - Disk Repair.

repair SSD

Step 3. Select the SSD, click on Repair or Format tool to help you fix minor errors on the SSD.

If you are going to sell or dispose of the SSD, just choose Wipe Hard Drive mode to help you format and wipe the SSD. All data on the SSD will be permanently erased, can’t be recovered by any data recovery software. And it will fix all errors on the SSD so that it could be reused.

wipe SSD

DoYourData Author

Written & Updated by Nancy

Nancy works as a tech columnist at DoYourData. She is familiar with macOS and Windows OS and writes computer solution, data recovery, disk clone, data erasure articles for DoYourData. She is a big fan of Mac products and is fond of testing utilities software (such as cleaner, recovery, eraser, NTFS for Mac, video editor, etc) on Mac.

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