Xbox Series X won't detect my external drive

MC HAMM3RTIME · Nov 20, 2020

Hi everyone,

I just got my new series x and I got everything set up (all relatively straightforward), but I can't get it to detect my external hard drive for some reason. This is the same one I was using on my xbox one. It's a Seagate that uses USB 3.0 and it basically
holds my entire xbox one game collection (over 4tbs).

I'm using the cord, I verified power is working, I tried all three USB ports, console restarts, full reset, and nothing seems to work. I can't find anything online with other issues like this so I'm thoroughly confused as to why it's not working.

Does anyone know of a fix for this or maybe a workaround? I can't deal with just the 800 gbs of storage on this console and I wasn't planning on having to purchase more storage so soon.

:)

Nursemorph

You should be able to do that, yes:

"Power down your Xbox One.

Unplug the external drive.
Connect the external drive to your Xbox Series X, S.
Power on your Xbox Series X, S.
Wait for the external drive to be detected. This may take a couple of minutes.
When the drive is detected, you are free to copy any games you want onto the Xbox Series X, S internal storage."

Taken from here:

https://www.windowscentral.com/how-transfer-data-xbox-one-series-x-series-s

Obsessive Power

Hi,

Do you still have your Xbox One and does your external hard drive still work on that console?

I have successfully connected both my Seagate 'Game Drive' and my external SSD USB 3.0 drives to my Series S without any problems. All my installed games show up fine.

The Series X/S supports the same external drives as the Xbox One/S/X support. If your drive isn't being detected it's probably become corrupted or has a hardware issue.

Obsessive Power

Fair enough, a slow internet connection is as good excuse as any.

Be aware however that while that drive will work on Series X, you won't be able to play Series X games directly from it. Series X games will require faster access and read speeds. My understanding is that the Series X games can be 'backed up' on an external
drive and then need to copied/moved over to either the internal SSD or the External SSD's that will be available for the machine.

The Series X will read and play Xbox One games from an external drive though.

Smwutches

This article explains the difference between using a regular external hard drive versus the custom external storage for the Series S/X- https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/09...xbox-series-s-custom-storage-solution-primer/

An external hard drive used on the One will work for the Series S/X, but won't have the exact same performance as the one created for the Series S/X.

Obsessive Power

Hi,

Do you still have your Xbox One and is the hard drive working on this machine?

Xbox Series X won't detect my external drive