take a look at Finder Preferences. You will find them in the menu bar when Finder is the active application.
Under the General tab, in the "Show these items on the desktop:" make sure there is a check mark alongside Hard disks, external disks and CDs, DVDs and iPods
P
MacBookAir model 4,2
Mac OSX version 10.7.5
How do I get the Hard Disk to reappear on the desktop. It was here 3 days ago and now I can't find it anywhere.
I'd like the original instead of an alias, if possible. There is nowhere in my preferences that I can turn the Hard Disk appearance on or off.

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