External HD Not Indexing

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sypark Author

Level 2

370 points

External HD Not Indexing

I can't seem to search on my external HD so I did a little poking around and found this terminal code:

sudo mdutil -a -i on

It stated indexing and searching for this drive was disabled

So I went to preferences under Spotlight and added my drive to the Privacy list and then removed it.

Same response with sudo mdutil -a -i on

Any other suggestions? This seems to be a common problem.

My external HD is a Seagate 2 TB portable drive.

I'm running a 2021 iMac, Ventura 13.4.1.

Thanks!

iMac

Posted on Aug 2, 2023 02:10 PM

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Answer 1

Dorain1

Community Specialist

Aug 3, 2023 11:45 AM in response to sypark

Hi sypark,

Thanks for reaching out and posting in Apple Support Communities.

It sounds like you have tried some good troubleshooting steps, we appreciate you sharing those with us. While we are not familiar with terminal command used, the steps you tried for Spotlight Privacy were the correct ones to take. To see the details, making sure you followed the steps as written, see Change Siri & Spotlight settings on Mac - Apple Support.

The next step would be to Rebuild the Spotlight index on your Mac - Apple Support. This step can be time consuming, but you can still use your Mac while it's reindexing.

If you are still unable to view the external hard drive after reindexing, we recommend contacting Apple Support. You can reach out to them here: Get Support.

Good luck!

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External HD Not Indexing

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