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There are scenarios wherein you plug in your hard disk, PEN Drive, SD card, USB Flash drive or any other storage device into your computer and latter asks you to either scan and fix or cancel. The error message is thrown as prompt to scan and fix or cancel which keeps recurring every time you select ‘cancel.’ When you select ‘scan and fix’ it asks you to format your external drive. When you cancel the formatting option and try to open it, it throws error “G:\ is not accessible. The volume does not contain a recognized file system. Please make sure that all required file system drivers are loaded and that the volume is not corrupted.”
In this blog we are going to learn reasons and fixes for this error.
Probable Reasons For This Error
Primarily this error occurs due to file system situation and does not let you access or read data contained in a drive. It occurs particularly when the information regarding type of file system is missing or is not consistent amongst many system tables. This can be explained in lucid language as below:
- Your computer does not recognize the file system of your storage device.
- The file system of your device is not available or is missing.
- File system is damaged or corrupt.
- Your device is not formatted correctly.
- Drive is corrupt.
- Bad sectors on drive.
- Drive has become RAW.
- Space not allocated.
- Deletion of necessary system files accidentally.
- Improper shut down of computer.
- Power surge or sudden cut of power supply.
- Encryption of volume or disk.
- Error in partition table.
It is always recommended that external hard drive or any other storage device should be removed or unplugged from your computer in proper and prescribed manner only least you lose your data.
It is always recommended that precaution is better than cure. so in order to avoid this error follow the precautions listed under:
- Whenever you unplug any external drive, remember to click ‘Safely Remove Hardware’ icon on the task bar or ensure that the external drive has completed all activities like reading/writing data. Then go to Start>>Settings>>Devices>>Select the external drive>>Remove device.
- Regularly scan your computer and external drives for virus using a reliable and efficient anti-virus software and always beware of suspicious links and applications, emails, attachments etc.
- You should keep your storage devices in safe environment, handle them carefully and avoid their exposure to extreme environment conditions.
- You are always recommended to keep back-up of your important data regularly in multiple copies and keep them at different and distant places.
SFC utility is a built-in tool in Windows purposed to scan your computer system files to find if any is missing or corrupt and then repairs the concerned files. To run SFC scan, follow the steps given below:
- Go to Start and type CMD to open command prompt.
- Select Run as administrator.
- Type sfc/scannow and press Enter
- Restart your computer once scanning process is complete.
To scan your drive for any error, plug in your drive to your computer and follow the steps given under.
- Open File Explorer and select This PC.
- Right-click the drive showing error and select Properties.
- Select Tools and click check
- Click Scan drive.
- Once the process is complete, go to This PC and check if the drive opens.
This built-in utility of Windows helps you to scan drive for bad sector(s). Follow the steps given under to run this utility:
- Follow the steps 1-2 of method 1 and type chckdsk D:/f (‘D:’ is the drive letter so replace the same with your drive letter) and press Enter
- Restart your computer once scan is over.
Updating USB drive can fix the volume which is not containing the recognized system file. Follow the steps given below to update USB drive:
- Go to Start and type Device manager and open it.
- Find Universal Serial Bus Controllers and expand it.
- Right-click Generic USB Hub.
- Select Update Driver.
You can use various methods for partition format but you may lose data. Follow the steps given under:
- Plug in the erring external drive.
- Go to Start ,type Disk Management and open
- Right click the portion you want to format.
- Click Format.
- Rename Volume label as per your need and ease.
- Select File system as FAT32 or NTFS.
- Select Default for Allocate unit size.
- Check Perform a quick format.
- Press Ok.
- Wait till the process is complete.
There are times when none of the above methods work for some reason or sometimes you do not have much time to spend for working on this error or sometimes some users do not have inclination towards technicalities, and they want the issue solved by simpler means. In such cases we recommend you to take resort to some efficient and reliable tool created for the purpose. Kernel for Window Data Recovery tool helps you to recover your all lost, inaccessible, or deleted data from corrupt Windows partitions and external storage devices like USB drive, PEN drive, SD Cards, external hard drives etc. by scanning all the latter for corruptions, bad sectors and errors and finally recovering data from disks, partitions and sectors. It is an easy-to-use tool yet works efficiently, expeditiously, and accurately.
Winding up
It is frustrating at times when you end up finding your own data inaccessible or lost in various scenarios from your computer or any other external storage device due to various errors like Windows safe mode not working and you need to recover lost data from corrupted flash drives. Even other necessities like recover data from external hard drive. No doubt you need patience, time and efforts to get it back rather recover it back in its original form and complete. Whenever you chose any third-party software tool for the purpose you should always pick the one which is credible, efficient, promising and certainly easy to use as you would not want to end up getting tangled in yet another confusions and technicalities.