New external hard drive recognized for media - won't format for games and apps.

I've just purchased a 2tb USB 3.0 Seagate external hard drive for extra game storage. When I plugged it into the xbox one it was immediately recognized, but only for media. No menu came up for me to format the drive for Xbox One game and app storage, It
just assumed it was for media.

For the life of me I can not find where to format the drive for games & apps. I've read countless threads saying to go to System>Manage Storage and there is absolutely nowhere I can manually select to format the drive. I select the drive and press the
menu button, and all there is to select is "Help" and "Switch Profile"

I manually re-formatted the hard drive on my PC to see if that would solve it as it did for some others; but when I plug it back into the XBox, it just tells me it's ready for media. I've tried hard resets on the xbox, different ports, un-selecting the
"power off storage" check box, everything I can find and think of.

This is extremely frustrating because I've bought a few digital download games that I can't even play because I have no space.

Am I the only one that has run into this issue? I can't find anything relating to this.

Thanks in advance to anyone that can offer some worth while suggestions.

:)

 

No format option for external hard drive.

Hi, when i plug in a external hard drive in my Xbox One the format option does not come up. It's a new drive, usb 3.0 and 3 tb and it is recognized as a media drive. No format option in manage storage, only view content. Tried hard resets, formatting to
exFAT and FAT32 etc.

Does anyone have solution? Thnx!

 

New external hard drive recognized for media - won't format for games and apps.

Hi wKs V MaKaVeLi,

Yes, you've lost all your movies and tv shows unfortunately... formatting the hard drive to store games and apps erases everything that is currently on the drive, and makes it so only the Xbox One can use it (unless you format it using a PC/Mac for use there
- it can't be used for both at the same time though).

 

Same issue here bought a 1tb wd my passport ultra and having the exact same issue

 

I was having this exact same problem with my 1 tb wd passport ultra i went into Setting>Power and Startup, and turn off the "when xbox is off, turn off storage" and it fixed the problem as soon as i unplugged and plugged back in my external hard drive. I
hope this helps.

 

I had the same issue, and just found how to resolve it. I tried all the resets and different ports etc, but it was still showing media only. For you tech guys out there(which I am not), I'm using a Western Digital My Passport 1TB External HD.

Go to Settings>Manage Storage. The device should be listed next to your internal hard drive, showing like a music note icon. If you hit the "Start/3Line" button all you'll get is a 'help' and 'switch profile' option. HIT THE "A" button instead, and I had
an option plain and simple to "Format for Games & Apps". Only took about 3 seconds to finish.

From there you can access contents and move between devices etc. Hope it helps, not a big forums guy.

 

I have a HGST Touro S 1TB 7200RPM and am having the same issue. Neither of the suggestions worked

 

I was having this problem, but it is fixed now.

I took a new drive with no partition or format and put it into an external USB 3.0 case, then partitioned and formatted it (EXFAT) in my laptop. It was recognized fine, but when I went through the process of formatting it for apps and games, nothing would
happen and it still had the same name and was set for only music, etc.

I reconnected the drive to my laptop and deleted the partition, then re-created the partition without formatting it. Then the Xbox was able to format the drive for apps and data.

 

@Muysutil,

How do you do that?

I'm getting a little frustrated as I bought the recommended HDD for the X1.

 

Steps to solve external hard drive issues for use with games and apps:

1) Format the drive to NTFS to get the Xbox One to recognize it as a media device.

• Plug the drive into your PC
• Press the Windows Key + E to bring up Windows Explorer
• Find the drive in the sidebar on the left, right click on it and select "Format..."
  
• Format the drive. NTFS is the only important thing; default settings should be fine.
  
• This may take awhile. Disconnect the drive when the format completes

2) Format the drive to work with Xbox One games and apps.

• Turn on your Xbox One, press the Menu button on your controller and navigate to the Settings page
  
• Navigate to System, then Manage Storage
• Plug in the external hard drive, it should appear to the right of Internal storage. If it does not, verify it fulfills the listed requirements on the Storage page
  
• Highlight the drive, select it with the A button (or voice or gesture), and then select Format [drive for Xbox One games and apps]
  
• Almost instantly it should be formatted and you're good to go!

 

@digital limit,

Thanks, you're a legend

 

Sorry, didn't get back here until now. It looks like you are good though. Maybe the key is the NTFS format if you format the drive. Anyways, it appears that it will work if you leave the partition unformatted or format it with NTFS.

Here's a good link for partitioning either with or without formatting:

windows.microsoft.com/.../create-format-hard-disk-partition

 

I have a WD 1 to worked good for a week now the drive doesn't show up and I can't access it.....

 

@xCDeath69x

Your drive may have failed. You may need to return it if it's still under warranty. A good check is to attempt to format it with your computer again. Don't worry about your data; everything important is still in the "cloud."

 

@digital limit thanks for the response the computer sees the drive in disk management but I can't reformat it for sone reason right clicking doesn't give you a reformat option