[SOLVED] Trouble with Multiple Seagate USB Drives

[Circa 3000]

I purchased two identical Seagate Backup Plus 8 TB USB drives from Costco. When I attached the first of the two drives, everything worked perfectly. But then, when I removed the first drive and attached the second drive, Windows 10 barfed - said the drive is "Not Initialized." And when I try to initialize it, I get an error, "The system cannot find the file specified."

For the record, when I removed the first drive, Windows wouldn't allow it - said the drive was "in use." So, I had to manually force it "Offline" first. Then, it ejected fine. When I re-attached the first drive, it was recognized by Windows perfectly and automatically taken "Online."

Now, I don't actually believe there's anything wrong with the second disk. I think it has something to do with the fact that these are identical drives and Windows is getting confused. I say this because, just a few months ago, I had similar troubles with a pair of Seagate 5 TB drives. The failures were different but, again, the first drive worked fine and things only went wonky when I tried to use the second drive.

I suspect there's a quick way to 'brand' the drives so Windows can better tell them apart, but I don't know how. I did relabel the first drive, but the second drive remains "Non Initialized" and I can't seem to change this. Maybe I can take it to another computer and do some sort of branding there?

Any suggestions are appreciated.

 

[Circa 3000]

Well, I just attached the second drive to a different computer - my laptop - and after about 30 seconds, Windows tells me, "The last USB device you connected to this computer malfunctioned, and Windows does not recognize it." I can also hear the heads thrashing for a couple seconds, so maybe the drive is indeed bad.

What's more, it doesn't even appear in Disk Manager on my laptop, so there's no option to go offline, online, or be initialized, or anything.

Bad drive? Huh. Seems a pretty big coincidence that this happened twice.

Next time, if I purchase two identical drives, I'll maybe check 'em out on different computers first and, at a minimum, relabel 'em.

 

[popatim]

I've two external 8TB hdd's and no issue running them both.
I believe you just got a bad drive.