Very frustrating external hard drive issues...

Hi, my hard drive deleted my XBOX Live preview invite and blah blah blah... just kidding, but seriously. I've been messing with this *** GoFlex 2tb Hard drive for two days, and I'm almost ready to set it of fire, and put it out with a sledge hammer. Any
support would be highly appreciated. Here's the situation... I just got my XBOX One, and after a month, I'm already out of memory, so I try to format this GoFlex drive, but of course it doesn't give me a format option. I do a search, and see that the drive
has to be partitioned, so I go into device manager... partition half of the drive... plug it in, and still no option to format, so I try to format it on the PC, then plug it in, and am relieved to finally see the option to format on the XBOX One. I go and
select to use the drive as the main goto for downloading games, name the drive, then format, and it kicks me out to the storage device screen with my hard drive still unformatted... after a lot of cussing, I go into my living room, and try to format it on
my other XBOX One, and still get the exact same results. This seems to defy all logic, and a resolve would be greatly appreciated... and please skip all of the "hard reset" responses.

:)

 

Xbox unable to load games at all

I am not using a external drive

 

Xbox unable to load games at all

If you have an external hard drive could you try deleting a game and installing it directly to the console's hard drive to rule out issues with the external drive itself?

 

Hi xX Dev1anc3 Xx,

Did you try to hard reset your Xbox? Kidding .... So for sure it's not going to work if you partition it. The Xbox is going to want to use the whole drive, not a partition of it. If you plug it back into your Windows machine does it show un-formatted,
or does it show NTFS, or something else? Forgive me as I don't know the model of this, but some Seagate drives require a web UI to configure, is this one of those, or is this just a USB portable drive? If it's a portable drive, and you go into Windows Disk
Management, you should see an option for format it (be CAREFUL here if you don't know much about computers, you could potentially format the wrong drive). If you're not comfortable in Disk Management, I recommend
skipping it, or finding someone a little more familiar with this utility. So if it is portable, no UI, and you can format it, then do that, and then plug it into the Xbox and see what happens.

Let us know!

 

Thanks for the fast response. The drive is currently formatted to my PC, and is showing up as NTFS. After I partitioned the drive, and the XBOX One didn't give me the format option, I formatted it on my laptop, and then plugged it back into the XBOX One,
and that's when it gave me the option to format, but booted me to the storage device menu before the formatting was completed. I've tried to format it with no partition at all, just unallocated space, and it would not detect the drive. I tried one primary
partition, and it recognized the drive, but no format option was given. The only way I can get a format option the show up on the XBOX One at all is to have the partition split the drive in two, and then format it on the PC... then it just boots me before
the format is complete. This drive works fine too. I've been using it for 3 months with no issues.

 

Hi xX Dev1anc3 Xx,

So in my experience if you cannot format the whole disk, it's not going to work. Xbox just won't see the partition, and read / write from that. And as Xbox is Windows based, I would guess that if you can't format in Windows, the Xbox can't format it.
Which is probably why it tries, and then gives up.

 

Hmmm... this may be a lost cause. I don't understand why XBOX One is discriminating against this one particular drive though. There has to be a logical explanation. I'll give it a few more tries I guess, then get back on eBay to search for another external
hard drive. Thanks for your help though. I miss my 360 more and more everyday.

 

Just another small amusing update... out of desperation, I set up the hard drive to have one primary partition, then formatted, and plugged it into the XBOX One, and of course it didn't give me the format option, so I plugged it into my trusty and reliable
(software wise) 360, and it formatted the drive to FAT without a hitch, so then I plugged it back into the XBOX One, and am astonished to now have the format option available, so I hurry up and select it before it disappears or something, go through the set
up..... and am booted back to the storage management screen with an unformatted hard drive once again. This console better be glad it has some awesome games backing it up, or it would be listed on eBay... no reserve.

 

I spent all day transferring the data from another Seagate drive to this drive figuring that there was no way two drives would be rejected... Wrong, no format option for the other drive either. The OS on this console is such a piece of ***. What gives Microsoft?
The original XBOX was a huge step forward with a fully functional dashboard, custom soundtracks, and eventually XBOX Live... 360 came and took another huge leap by offering streaming, XBOX Live arcade, avatars, chatpads, and an even better dashboard... XBOX
One comes out with a cluttered mess of a dashboard, NO custom soundtracks unless you like having 25% of your screen taken up by that almost useless snap option, no XBOX Live Arcade, no chatpad, that stupid special adapter for the headset (...didn't anyone
learn from the original 360 headset?), no scene skipping for video streaming, and an OS that barely functions. It can't even format a Seagate external drive... a drive that I shouldn't even need if the games didn't take up about 50gb a piece. This "New XBOX
Experience" better be worth the hype, or I'm about to sell off both of my XBOX Ones, and just play my 360 and hope Nintendo pulls their head out of their *** and comes out with a console that will put them back on top where they belong... thank you, drive
through.

 

What model drive are you using?

 

The first one is a Seagate GoFlex Desk 2tb, the second is an older Seagate Free Agent 1.5tb... neither will format. I've tried just about everything I can think of. I guess that I'm going to delete most of the games on my hard drive, and try to wait it
out in hopes that the new OS update fixes this issue so I don't have to buy yet another hard drive for this picky console. Maybe I should try to *** myself out for a preview invite like most of the other desperate individuals flooding Console Support like
a bunch of dope fiends looking for a fix. I don't see why I didn't get an invite anyway... three Original XBOX's, three 360's, two XBOX One's, and I've been on XBL since a week before Halo 2 came out back in 04'.... not to mention I'm a Windows 10 Insider.
What do I have to do? Pimp out my somewhat attractive girlfriend? ... sing Lady Gaga in a well known hardcore biker bar on karaoke night? ... give away my first born child to be eaten by rabid squirrels? ... *** that. I'll wait.

 

HI xX Dev1anc3 Xx,

So what happens in Windows when you try to format? I'm seeing online that a FreeAgent model was something someone used to load games to. When you plug it in does anything happen? Have you plugged it into Windows to see if there are multiple partitions
on it? Technically the Xbox should see it, and it should be able to wipe the drive. Maybe if you can plug this into Windows and format it, then plug it into the Xbox you'll have better luck.

Also, can you post the exact model number? Can you verify if it's USB 3.0, because looking online at a FreeAgent 1.5 TB is shows it's USB 2.0 which won't work with the Xbox.

 

Also if you have the exact model number for the other drive, and still have it, post that too, and I'll check out all the specs of that drive.

 

Ugh, I just did some research myself. That Free Agent drive is a 2.0, and this GoFlex CAN be upgraded to a 3.0 but you have to fork out for an adapter. I thought that it was a 3.0 out of the box... Well, I guess that solves that. It would have helped if
the XBOX One OS would have told me that, or gave me any kind of error message instead of just booting me to the management screen. This thing still needs a lot of work. I have the adapter ordered already, so when it gets here, I'll post the results. Thank
you for your help and determination Hydro Skillet. You're a gentleman and a scholar.

 

No worries. I should have said USB 3.0 off the start.