Question Can't access an external HDD with Windows 7 on it, what do i do?

[mynameisjoe1]

Hi all, so i just installed Windows 10 on an SSD and made the old main hard drive an external HDD so the files from that drive could be accessible from Windows 10. But there is a problem, Windows 10 says I need permission to access that drive and then it starts loading constantly. Is there a way to bypass this?. It just keeps loading and takes forever, it wont let me access the files. But I can access the files in Linux no problem. Tried copying the files to another drive but it wont let me.... IN LINUX!!. Like what the heck. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Colif]

its a permissions problem, linux shouldn't care about windows permissions but win 10 can tell your current user didn't create those files.
If hd was internal it would ask if you want to take ownership and allow you access to them, it sounds like it asked you but then got stuck talking to drive itself.

How did you make drive external?

the linux part is odd, it shouldn't have a problem copying the files? which version of linux?

 

[howtobeironic]

Linux is usually more verbose at errors than Windows, so how exactly does it fail? An error message like "Access Denied"? Or does it just get stuck? If it doesn't, create a new Linux stick (for safety) and try copying a file using terminal. An easy-to read document here: https://www.maketecheasier.com/copy-paste-files-linux-command-line/

If the error is just an "Access Denied" you can try the copy command again by adding the word "sudo" at the start of the command, just like "sudo cp filename destination" which will use the root access to copy it. If that fails, the disk is faulty. Would be clever to back/clone the drive beforehand though. Sudo commands aren't things to be careless around.

Side note, I have explained this in very simple terms, not because of any estimation, but to help that one guy coming here after 10 years looking for the same problem.

 

[mynameisjoe1]

Linux is usually more verbose at errors than Windows, so how exactly does it fail? An error message like "Access Denied"? Or does it just get stuck? If it doesn't, create a new Linux stick (for safety) and try copying a file using terminal. An easy-to read document here: https://www.maketecheasier.com/copy-paste-files-linux-command-line/

If the error is just an "Access Denied" you can try the copy command again by adding the word "sudo" at the start of the command, just like "sudo cp filename destination" which will use the root access to copy it. If that fails, the disk is faulty. Would be clever to back/clone the drive beforehand though. Sudo commands aren't things to be careless around.

I don't remember the error code but I've encountered this problem every time I install windows and add an old HDD that had Windows installed on it before.

All I had to do was wait a bit and I was able to access the drive, I should of posted that here at the time but I forgot.

But in Ubuntu or Fedora I was not able to copy the files from one HDD to another HDD for some reason, it wouldn't let me, and thats the latest version of both Linux operating systems. I was able to do this before with older versions of these Linux OS's.

No biggie anymore, my client was able to access her files. I just added an SSD to her computer (HP) and installed Windows 10, so the old Windows 7 HDD was her secondary drive.

Thanks for the help!.

its a permissions problem, linux shouldn't care about windows permissions but win 10 can tell your current user didn't create those files.
If hd was internal it would ask if you want to take ownership and allow you access to them, it sounds like it asked you but then got stuck talking to drive itself.

How did you make drive external?

the linux part is odd, it shouldn't have a problem copying the files? which version of linux?

Hopefully my response above will answer your questions, but thanks for the help and everything.