What is the easiest way for my new rig to recognize the 2nd drive used for storage?

[Teknicolby]

I was running Windows 7 x64 Pro in a rig and updated my mobo, GPU, CPU, and cooler. I have a 500GB Samsung EVO 840 SSD as my primary/boot drive and I use a 2TB Seagate for my storage of any and everything not necessary for speed.

Basically my disk shows up in BIOS, Disk Management, but not in Windows Explorer. Anyone have any ideas? People have stated the "Make disk dynamic" option, but that seems unintuitive and there has to be an easier way without risk of losing data or having to backup 1.5TB of what I have on that disk.

Any help is greatly appreciated!!

Teknicolby

Current rig:

Coolermaster HAF 922
ASUS X99-PRO
Intel i7 5930k (2011 v-3)
Corsair H100i Liquid Cooling
Mushkin Blackline DDR4 PC4-22400 (2 x 4GB)
Corsair TX850w PSU
Samsung EVO 840 500GB SSD
Seagate Barracuda 2TB

 

[Teknicolby]

Oh my gosh........I could have held off but will publish my own remedy to the situation. I feel so dumb!!

I had the same problem and you do NOT have to convert to dynamic back to basic. The OS (Windows 8.1 x64) doesn't recognize the disk with a drive letter like your old OS did (Windows 7 x64 in my case).

Just Right-Click where it says "Storage Unit" and describes the drive as Healthy (system, active, primary partition) or however it is worded in your instance. Do not right-click where the Disk number is because all you will get is "Properties", "Help" or "Convert to Dynamic Disk".

You should have the option to "Change Drive Letter or Path" or maybe even "Assign a drive letter". The new OS doesn't know what letter to assign the old drive with data on it, so just give it a letter. Simple as that!! My drive was always Z, so as soon as I assigned Z to that 2 TB storage disk, my drive was recognized immediately.

All this talk about conversion and losing data is absolutely not necessary. Hopefully someone else has posted this somewhere, but if not, here you go! Easiest solution hands down.

Teknicolby