More info needed. How are you running Jellyfin? How is the drive attached? What OS?
this post was submitted on 29 Dec 2025
1 points (53.8% liked)
Jellyfin: The Free Software Media System
8600 readers
3 users here now
Current stable release: 10.11.6
Matrix (General Information & Help)
Matrix (Off-Topic) - Come get to know the team and blow off steam!
Matrix Space - List of all the available rooms on Matrix.
Discord - Bridged to our Matrix rooms
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
Linux mint on a mini pc attached with External Hard Drive Cable
Forgot to mention this is a follow up of a post from yesterday
Ok so you’re using docker, the drive is a USB disk?
I think you need to:
- create a mount point folder
- mount the drive in fstab so it’s available on boot
- create a dedicated user for Jellyfin to run as
- make sure the new user has read/write access to the folders with media (this may mean changing ownership, adding to a new or existing group)
- set the docker container to run as the new user
- add the mount point as a volume inside the docker container
- add the folders with media in Jellyfin
No docker ran it off the terminal and the drive is a portable HHD
Ok so the issue was it not being mounted corrected but it’s been fixed and I’ve tested it on a number of devices and I can confirm it’s working now only took me over a year 2 different OS and 3 different devices to get Jellyfin working (which will admit was due to user error)
Add your disk to fstab, and make sure jellyfin user has access to it. Mint may have a GUI tool Disks to manage disks, but reading the Arch wiki article is a good idea.
Can you browse to the files via the mount point? Is the external drive listed at all?
From there you want to make sure you have the location listed as the library location in jellyfin. Then make sure the naming/file structure is correct according to the jellyfin documentation.
It’s not listed on Jellyfin but on the pc itself I can access it
Did you create a library in jellyfin?
That’s what I’m trying to do the files I want to add to the library are on the drive which I can’t see on Jellyfin
So when you go to create the library in jellyfin you don't see the external drive but see your other drives as options?
I only see the internal storage
Does the user running the jellyfin service have permissions to read the folder/files? You aren't running jellyfin in docker by chance, right?
Tried the docker method earlier and had no luck I downloaded and am running it straight off the terminal
@Pacrat173 can you define “no luck”?
Your problem may not be related to docker or the way you run Jellyfin
When trying to run the docker I got an error. I can access the server both on my PC and phone after I switched the terminal something i hadn’t been able to do with any other method