pedrobedro
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I had a similar problem and sorted it with a free version of Minitool Partition Wizard.
- Thread starter gerrymoore
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gerrymoore
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Thanks again lads .... Gaz it updated to Win10 probably 2 years ago?? I've never had any problems apart from it not 'sleeping' after an update...since then a new update has let it go to sleep!!
I can see the drives in the disc management app but they show up as unpopulated. I can populate them and the correct figures come up but then I get the 'migration' problem showing up.
Pedro ..I'll take a look at the Minitool but the external drives in themselves are perfect when I plug into my laptop so not sure if it's a partition problem
I'm wondering whether it's something gone awry in the BIOS but it's a loooonnnnggg time since I played with any BIOS settings and don't want to brick my lovely PC
I can see the drives in the disc management app but they show up as unpopulated. I can populate them and the correct figures come up but then I get the 'migration' problem showing up.
Pedro ..I'll take a look at the Minitool but the external drives in themselves are perfect when I plug into my laptop so not sure if it's a partition problem
I'm wondering whether it's something gone awry in the BIOS but it's a loooonnnnggg time since I played with any BIOS settings and don't want to brick my lovely PC
gerrymoore
CNC expert (well, getting there!)
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No all separate enclosures and they all work perfectly with my laptop ... for now I'll just use pensticks or SD cards as they are still OK with the PC ..may have to seek professional help for the first time in over 30 years 
How about testing them on another desktop.No all separate enclosures and they all work perfectly with my laptop ... for now I'll just use pensticks or SD cards as they are still OK with the PC ..may have to seek professional help for the first time in over 30 years
It certainly sounds like it's your PC that's having problems rather than the drives or cables to them.
You are using the same USB cable from the drive to Desktop AND Laptop I assume.??
What to Do When Your USB Drive Is Not Showing Up
USB is an extensively adopted technology that allows us to plug lots of devices into our computers every day. Although it’s quite easy to set up, sometimes it’s not all [...]
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Pigeon_Droppings2
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I once had problems when I formatted an external drive on my Mac...windows wouldn't recognise it!
Could you remove the drive and plug it directly into the mother board...eliminate things like usb issues.
Could you remove the drive and plug it directly into the mother board...eliminate things like usb issues.
qwakers
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It is likely the backup software has installed a mass storage or usb "driver" that is screwing with native access. Wiping all the usb devices in device manager may sort it. If not a slightly more selective prune in mass storage devices will most likely boot the rouge software out. Might be worth uninstalling the backup software also.
gerrymoore
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I've sussed it!!!! Guy on youtube mentioned this Not Migrated problem as something to do with drive letters..... In the past when I have plugged in an external drive it always came up as 'L' drive but now it just didn't show up. So, in diskmanager I noticed 4 entries that had no drive letter assigned. It wouldn't let me do anything to these. I plugged in a drive and it showed a new unassigned drive and let me assign a drive letter so I assigned L. L then showed up but windows said there was a problem that had to be fixed ...30 seconds later all was well. I rebooted and plugged in the drive and Voila I had an L drive showing and working 
I then proceeded to assign a new letter to my other 5 drives M N O P and Q windows said the same with every drive ..... a problem needed fixing ...now all my drives are working again with their newly assigned drive letters
The only remaining 'problem' is that the spurious drives are still showing in diskmanager and won't let me delete them but hey-ho who cares ....
I must say I don't understand why or how this happened as I have never had to assign separate letters to external drives before today but lesson learned - in future leave well alone!!
Thanks to everyone that has replied I am grateful for all the help and support
.............. Gerry
I then proceeded to assign a new letter to my other 5 drives M N O P and Q windows said the same with every drive ..... a problem needed fixing ...now all my drives are working again with their newly assigned drive letters The only remaining 'problem' is that the spurious drives are still showing in diskmanager and won't let me delete them but hey-ho who cares ....
I must say I don't understand why or how this happened as I have never had to assign separate letters to external drives before today but lesson learned - in future leave well alone!!
Thanks to everyone that has replied I am grateful for all the help and support
.............. Gerry
gerrymoore
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No nothing just films music and bits and bobs but the main pc has a LOT of stuff that I don't want to lose hence the original attempt at a backup ... and that didn't go well
Diskpart in either powershell or command prompt will let you fix those phantom entries. Needs to be run as administrator.
As for backups, if you do them with a software program then you will likely need the same program if you ever need to do a restore. For this reason I always use Robocopy in a shell script or batch file. This just copies the files and directories you specify and it will run incrementally if you want to schedule it in scheduled tasks. It’s so good I use it in work to take backups of data on the smaller remote sites. Bullet proof.
As for backups, if you do them with a software program then you will likely need the same program if you ever need to do a restore. For this reason I always use Robocopy in a shell script or batch file. This just copies the files and directories you specify and it will run incrementally if you want to schedule it in scheduled tasks. It’s so good I use it in work to take backups of data on the smaller remote sites. Bullet proof.
gaz1
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my backups are really done well
whilst i have an online pc i also have an offline pc as well backups are carried out on the offline machine whilst i transfer from a basic online machine
its paid off over the years been this way so that means im not using the drives and i do unplug them when not in use i also upgrades those drives every 2-3 years
i also check for stability of a new hard driveas ive had some failures of brand new hard drives
gaz1
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now my online machine is different i have a basic image with everything on it
programs, net and other things needed, this is all done offline as i need to create a non virused machine that hasnt touched the internet
this is where i create an image of the whole hard drive via acronis the net stuff is easy enough to upgrade once your back online again
but for a 6 minute reinstall on a new hard drive its worth it being this way even if you get a virus on it, it really makes no difference its jsut a clean wipe from a booted usb stick in dos mode use and reinstall it again
this is my transfer machine i get what i want and its used as a media type of machine ive also upgraded this machine by a good ssd hard drive
for speed reference its better to transfer to another ssd hard drive and transfer those files to the other offline pc
6 minutes for a full working reinstall is alot better than reinstalling windows and programs as well onto a machine
its also alot better than faffing around with windows 10 repair and reinstall as it aslo takes much longer to do it than the image reinstall
programs, net and other things needed, this is all done offline as i need to create a non virused machine that hasnt touched the internet
this is where i create an image of the whole hard drive via acronis the net stuff is easy enough to upgrade once your back online again
but for a 6 minute reinstall on a new hard drive its worth it being this way even if you get a virus on it, it really makes no difference its jsut a clean wipe from a booted usb stick in dos mode use and reinstall it again
this is my transfer machine i get what i want and its used as a media type of machine ive also upgraded this machine by a good ssd hard drive
for speed reference its better to transfer to another ssd hard drive and transfer those files to the other offline pc
6 minutes for a full working reinstall is alot better than reinstalling windows and programs as well onto a machine
its also alot better than faffing around with windows 10 repair and reinstall as it aslo takes much longer to do it than the image reinstall
what do you want to backup? any idea how much data it is?
if it's lots of photos etc it's just as easy to copy those yourself manually... especially if they're all in the same place
emails, documents etc. make it a bit more tricky... and the more of a pain something is the less likely you are to do it so more likely to lose stuff
if you have a usb drive big enough, (and I'm guessing just one drive in pc?) - copy your entire main HD to it before you make any more changes... windows has an option to backup like this but I've never used it, maybe someone else will chime in and say how good.bad it is
how big is your main drive?
drives are cheap enough now that the expensive 1tb drive you bought a few years back is less than £40 now
if you're up for spending a couple of hundred quid you could get nas to hold all your backups? - best off having backups away from your main pc incase something happens to it
if it's lots of photos etc it's just as easy to copy those yourself manually... especially if they're all in the same place
emails, documents etc. make it a bit more tricky... and the more of a pain something is the less likely you are to do it so more likely to lose stuff
if you have a usb drive big enough, (and I'm guessing just one drive in pc?) - copy your entire main HD to it before you make any more changes... windows has an option to backup like this but I've never used it, maybe someone else will chime in and say how good.bad it is
how big is your main drive?
drives are cheap enough now that the expensive 1tb drive you bought a few years back is less than £40 now
if you're up for spending a couple of hundred quid you could get nas to hold all your backups? - best off having backups away from your main pc incase something happens to it
