External Storage and 2012 Mac Mini Sleeping Issues

albert1028 · Nov 13, 2012, 05:39 PM

Hey All,

Wanted to see if people had experienced sleeping problems when an external hdd is connected. I have tried several external storage devices, including OWC Ministack but it won't sleep and the external device will wake it up. I have tried to look at what is keeping it up through terminal but search has not turned up anything.

dasx · Nov 13, 2012, 05:49 PM

I have two external drives always connected and my Mini has no problems at all with sleep.

It actually sleeps when I don't want it to (due to Mountain Lion… DOH). Here's where terminal's command 'caffeinate' comes in handy.

albert1028 · Nov 13, 2012, 07:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dasx

I have two external drives always connected and my Mini has no problems at all with sleep.

It actually sleeps when I don't want it to (due to Mountain Lion… DOH). Here's where terminal's command 'caffeinate' comes in handy.

That's good to know if others are not having these issues as well. I wonder what externals you have as in what type of USB chipset is connected. Is this on a 2012 mini?

pup · Nov 13, 2012, 08:49 PM

As above, I also have the opposite problem. My narcoleptic mini wants to nod off during handbrake encodes, and even puts external HD's to sleep in the middle of file transfers.

dasx · Nov 14, 2012, 02:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by albert1028

That's good to know if others are not having these issues as well. I wonder what externals you have as in what type of USB chipset is connected. Is this on a 2012 mini?

Yes, 2012 Mini. A 1TB FW800 iomega drive and a 1TB USB2.0 Toshiba one.

Quote:

Originally Posted by pup

As above, I also have the opposite problem. My narcoleptic mini wants to nod off during handbrake encodes, and even puts external HD's to sleep in the middle of file transfers.

Option 1 is to disable sleep, which I don't like.
Option 2 is to open terminal and type:

$ caffeinate -t number

Where number is a number of seconds. If you estimate the Handbrake is gonna take for lets say 7 hours. Just type:

$ caffeinate -t 25200

It'll stay away for 7 hours. Then will go to sleep as normal.

pup · Nov 14, 2012, 09:37 AM

Thanks. I actually downloaded the caffeine app after I discovered the problem. Hopefully it won't be an issue from here on.

Nov 13, 2012, 05:39 PM	#1
albert1028 macrumors regular Join Date: Jun 2007	External Storage and 2012 Mac Mini Sleeping Issues Hey All, Wanted to see if people had experienced sleeping problems when an external hdd is connected. I have tried several external storage devices, including OWC Ministack but it won't sleep and the external device will wake it up. I have tried to look at what is keeping it up through terminal but search has not turned up anything.
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Nov 13, 2012, 05:49 PM	#2
dasx macrumors 6502a Join Date: Jun 2012 Location: Barcelona	I have two external drives always connected and my Mini has no problems at all with sleep. It actually sleeps when I don't want it to (due to Mountain Lion… DOH). Here's where terminal's command 'caffeinate' comes in handy. __________________ 2012 Mac Mini
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Nov 13, 2012, 08:49 PM	#4
pup macrumors member Join Date: Dec 2009	As above, I also have the opposite problem. My narcoleptic mini wants to nod off during handbrake encodes, and even puts external HD's to sleep in the middle of file transfers.
	0

Nov 14, 2012, 09:37 AM	#6
pup macrumors member Join Date: Dec 2009	Thanks. I actually downloaded the caffeine app after I discovered the problem. Hopefully it won't be an issue from here on.
	0