MacBook Air no longer sees external SSD

Well I have "solved" the problem.

At least I have got the SSD to be recognised by my 2013 MacBook Air.

I tried Safe reboot. - No luck

I re-installed the operating system

Still no luck.

Reformatted the SSD as a Mac Journaled GUID .

Still nothing.

Took the external Samsung 2Gb SSD from my Mac Mini (and it's connecting cable) and plugged that into the MacBook Air.

It showed up immediately -

Took the cable from the 2Gb SSD and used it on my 250 Gb SSD and ..... whoopee it appears on my desktop.

So of course I then used the 'faulty' USB C to USB 3 cable (previously on my 250Gb SSD) and connected the 2Gb SSD back to my Mac Mini and that works fine too.

So it seems to point to a cable problem, but a problem that is tolerated by the Mac Mini but not by the MacBook Air.

Some people will shrug their shoulder and say "well, the Macbook Air is 9 years old, what d'you expect".

Perhaps that is the case but I'm looking forward to getting a few more years out of my old studio workhorse.

I don't ask it to do anything too intensive and let it live out its retirement in the peace of the studio - !!

The drive shows up without any problems on my other computers and they are all running different Mac OSs.

They are all connected via the USB ports, the Mac Mini and the newer M1 Macbook Air have the slimmed down USB 3 ports and they have no trouble with the SSD. My Older Mac Pro has the older classic USB and that too reads the drive without problems

I don't believe the Samsung SSD is at fault as it works everywhere else but on my older MacbookAir since the upgrade to BigSur.

"Have you already tried to reboot with the external drive connected?"

Yes.

First thing I tried.

Yes, both USB ports connect to my Nikon camera okay, and my wired mouse too.

The fact that this has happened after the upgrade to Big Sur does make me wonder if this maybe an odd OS glitch.

Can't think what else it can be 😕