If you meet the error saying “There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive” in Windows 10/7, read this post and you can learn why it occurs. More importantly, you can know how to fix the "no disk in the drive error" effectively.
“I get this error when I start my computer with Windows 10 installed as usual. The window prompts and says ‘There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive \Device\Harddisk6\DR6’. It is quite strange because I have not performed any operations since the startup. What does the error mean and how can I fix the error?”
Feel familiar with that error? Actually, you can get another similar error message when you try to print a Microsoft Word document: CiceroUIWndFrame, WINWORD.EXE\NoDisk\Device\Harddisk1\DR1.
Except Windows 10, the error also happens in Windows 7. Then, what does the error message refer to and what are the causes on earth?
You will not receive the error without reasons. It must be something wrong with some procedures of your computer. In other words, your computer needs a disk in the drive where it should have one yet no qualified storage there. Then, it tells you in that format. Causes for the error are different in different situations. What are they?
▶Drive letter C has been wrongly assigned to a removable disk drive. This mainly leads to error occuring at computer startup, like the user in the example at the beginning of this post.
▶The error occurs after some programs installed. When you run some add-on programs such as Spotify, MS Office, QuickBooks, Windows Live Photo Gallery, and NVIDIA, you’ll receive the error. A feature on those programs or a game interferes with your operating system.
▶There is no disk in said drive indeed. Insert a disk to that drive can fix the error.
▶Disk cannot be detected by Windows. If you have inserted a disk and still get the error, check the connection to make sure it can be detected by Windows. If it is not the problem of connection, you may need to check the disk for errors.
After knowing the causes for the Windows error there is no disk in the drive, you can find responding solutions based on different situations.
Several effective ways are introduced in following parts. Choose one of them based on your own situation.
If the error is caused by drive letter C wrongly assigned, you can change it back to normal in Disk Management or re-assign drive letter with Diskpart.
Ⅰ. Change drive letter in Disk Management
1. Right click This PC and select Manage. Click on Disk Management and you’ll see your disk information.
2. Right click removable disk and select Change Drive Letter and Paths.
3. Click Change button.
4. Choose one letter from the given list. Click OK and then Yes if it prompts.
Ⅱ. Assign drive letter in Diskpart
1. Press Win + R and type diskpart and press Enter. Run as administrator.
2. Type these commands in turn and each command has an Enter followed by: list volume> select volume (where n is the removable disk) > assign letter=o (where w is any drive letter you want to assign to) > exit.
Ⅲ. Change drive letter with freeware
If both Disk Management and Diskpart fail you in assign drive letter, you can turn to this free partition manager to have a try. AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard works perfect in Windows 10 as well as Windows 7. It has user-friendly interface which makes it easy-to-use for every user.
1. Download, install and start AOMEI Partition Assistant on your Windows 10.
2. Right click the system drive and select Advanced > Change Drive Letter.
3. Choose a letter from the given list in the pop-up window. And click OK.
4. Click Apply and then Proceed to execute the operation.
Tip: you can fix there is no disk in the drive in Windows 7 by repeating above steps as well.
As covered, the disk may not be detected by Windows even if you’re sure it is there. As a result, you need to confirm what the problem is. In general, there are two main reasons, corrupted disk and incorrect file system. Let’s get to know how to solve the troubles one by one.
Ⅰ. Check bad sectors
You can run chkdsk /f in command prompt to check bad sectors of that disk. However, you may encounter CHKDSK stuck in Windows 10 trouble. In that case, you can get assistance from aforementioned AOMEI Partition Assistant.
1. Run AOMEI Partition Assistant. Click the disk you want to check and select Test > Disk Surface Test.
2. Tick Quick Check and click Start to start the operation.
Tip: You can also right click the partition you want to check and select Check Partition.
Ⅱ. Format the disk copletely
If the no disk error message is caused by incorrect file system or corrupted files, you can format the disk thoroughly and try again.
1. Launch AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard. Right click the partition you want to format and select Format Partition.
2. Specify partition label, file system and cluster size in the popping up dialogue.
3. Click Apply and then Proceed to commit.
Tip: You can choose Wipe Hard Drive to erase the files as well.
If the “there is no disk in the drive” error comes without a reason, you can simply disable the error message notification by modifying its registry. Please note that registry is the essential database of Windows system, inappropriate operations may cause serious problem. So take these steps with caution please.
1. Press Win + R to start Run. Type regedit and press Enter to open Registry Editor. Run as administrator.
2. Navigate to this path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\Windows
3. Find the ErrorMode key, right click it and select Modify. You’ll get a prompt window. Change the value data from 0 to 2 and change the Base from Hexadecimal to Decimal.
Refresh and close the Registry Editor, and you should no longer receive that prompting error message now.
When you get “there is no disk in the drive” error in Windows 10 or Windows 7, stay calm and find the responding solutions to solve it. The main cause should be drive letter C been wrongly assigned, just give it back to the correct drive.
AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard is all-around partition software. Except for assign drive letter and format partition, you can use it to migrate Windows 10 to SSD for hard drive upgrading. Its advanced version also supports command line operations, you may want to upgrade and have a try.