?USB 3.0 gives 2.0 Transfer Speeds?

My USB 3.0 card is capping data transfer rates to USB 2.0 speeds with both my SSD External and my Hard Drive External. Files copy onto & off both drives at exact same speed they do when plugged into one of the 2.0 ports built into the MacPro.

It's a Generic Card off flea-bay.
I'm using the Latest Driver off Lacie Website.
I'm running Mountain Lion with all latest updates.

I haven't run a power link to the card yet - could that be the problem?

Richard in Michigan

goMac said:

This is also pretty likely.

A hard drive is too slow to use USB 3 speeds. An SSD should be fast on USB 3.0. You're still not going to use up the full speed of USB 3, but there should be a difference.

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Excellent Questions folks are asking.
A) The Hard Drive Enclosure is definitely USB 3.0 and so is the SSD Drive otherwise the Drives were built with 3.0 Spec Ports & included 3.0 Cables for Giggles.
B) I did controlled comparisons copying same 4gig file to each drive when each was connected first to a 2.0 port in front of my Mac then when connected to my 3.0 card. The File copied at exact same rate to each drive and Yes! Performed each copy test seperately to get a clean test result.
C) BTW I monitored the Data Rate using Activity Monitor (which I always have open) and the thru put I got in my experiments is the exact rate I always get moving files on & off my usb drives.
I wonder if I should repeat the tests with only one drive connected to the card at a time?

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System Profiler says I have SuperSpeed Ports. I will checkout the link u provided and I am certain driver loaded cuz prior to installing it the OS wouldn't see items plugged into the card.

goMac said:

This is also pretty likely.

A hard drive is too slow to use USB 3 speeds. An SSD should be fast on USB 3.0. You're still not going to use up the full speed of USB 3, but there should be a difference.

Click to expand...

VirtualRain said:

It could be a couple of things... (1) your media is not fast enough to exceed USB 2 speeds (2) you have the wrong driver or it's not loading... what chipset is on your card? If it's NEC, I had luck with this driver (see post #7) in ML. Check system report to see if you have super speed bus listed and driver loaded for your card.

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Excellent Thought, but Lacie got a lot of backlash on trying to monopolize mac users to Lacie Products and removed the crippleware code from the driver quite awhile back. I also downloaded the latest driver from them to run my tests with.

VirtualRain said:

I vaguely recall that Lacie had something in their original (early) USB 3 drivers that would only enable it on Lacei connected drives. I wonder if you have a crippled driver?

Click to expand...

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UPDATE:
I just discovered that it is Possible for me to write to my external SSD upto 60 MB/s which is 20 up from the 40 MB/s I was getting yesterday on the 3.0 Card and up the same 20 on the 40 I was getting off my MacPro's 2.0 ports.

I am starting to wonder if the USB 3.0 driver is being interfered with by a different Driver that's running.

ActionableMango said:

Have you ever had any other storage-related cards installed in this MP?

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Only card I've ever put in my MacPro is this Generic USB 3.0 Card.

I tested putting a 'Virgin' ML install on one of my usb drives (eg: only migrating settings with NO Accounts or Apps), booting from that, and Only installing the Lacie Driver.
Results were confusing.
The driver wouldnt get drives on card recognized, but uninstalling Lacie Driver and then installing the modified Kexts from the Link Virtual Rain posted got the card working. BUT in a flaky manner: losing drives when machine sleeps and then my Bluetooth signal was for crap, and the Finder crashed on me twice.
The data throughput was still capped at 40MB/s, as well.

When I booted back to my ordinary ML Boot Install the bluetooth signal was now reliable and drives stay connected during sleep. No Finder crashes now either.

I don't know what to think anymore.
Have to go find me a USB Card using Apple's Preferred interface chips, I guess.

Sigh.

Thx for the info.
I knew my throughput was pathetic in my tests. Even with a 5400 rpm drive my throughput over USB 3.0 shouldn't average in the mid 30 MB/s range with occassional daliances at 40MB/s.
I've got to solve my 3.0 Riddle soon or I'm going to have to set it aside for awhile. Again. Lots of things to invest my energies in and here I am ready to head->desk myself into unconsciousness in frustration.
RLW

wonderspark said:

Using the CalDigit FASTA-6GU3 card, I've personally had data throughput speeds of 168.5MB/sec write, and 242MB/sec read over the USB 3.0 ports, using a Crucial M4 SSD and a Voyager Q dock.

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