External Hard Drives Failing After Used on My M4 Mini

[theladyboo]

I have an M1 Mini 2020 and an M4 Mini 2024 that I bought this year. I had a bunch of external drives for the m1 because I had only bought a 256 Gig internal drive (hey, not all of us have the money for an expensive apple internal drive.) It worked flawlessly with these external drive for 5 years. I started using the drives on the M4 thinking it could work out. I was just going to use the 512 GB for apps and the MacOS and all data on the drive. Since the M4 only has the mini-c ports, I used an adapter. I didn't notice it right away, I thought the one drive had just failed. I noticed it when the second drive started making the same noise so I unplugged it and stopped using it before it died completely and I could get a full backup. (haven't done that yet.) Then, an older drive that I had moved some data earlier from the m4 to an older intel machine started flaking out. I had copied data on it before I knew there was a problem and had been using it without an issue. Now none of my machines can see it at all. I have the 2024 m4 Mini, 2020 m1 Mini, and a 2015 Mini that I rarely plug anything into except one time I plugged that last drive into it before it failed completely. I'm pretty sure it was in the M4 copying data right before that.

I can't mount the drives anywhere. I tried Disk Ulity on the M1 and with the drives plugged in, it just spins. The big drive that completely failed (a 20TB Seagate) whirs like it's reading the drive over every 10 to 20 seconds and never mounts.

So here I sit, just using the cloud and to scared to even spend money on a drive or use any of my old ones. I can still do so on the ones that haven't been corrupted yet, I just don't want to bother digging them out of the cabinet.

Has anyone else seen this problem? I've searched. I found one redditor with a similar problem on the M1 yet I've had no problems solely with the M1. They only started happening after the M4 and the adapter. My guess is that it is the USB to USB mini-c adapter for some reason.

Thanks

 

[Sheepish-Lord]

A lot of those older external drives relied on getting power from the port it was plugged, or external power supply, and would even do what you're talking about (spinning but not being read) so it could be an issue with whatever adapter you are using. The computers themselves shouldn't be writing any data as soon as you plugged them in so outside of it losing data when you disconnected it, especially if it's an older drive, I would look at the adapter first.

 

[theladyboo]

A lot of those older external drives relied on getting power from the port it was plugged, or external power supply, and would even do what you're talking about (spinning but not being read) so it could be an issue with whatever adapter you are using. The computers themselves shouldn't be writing any data as soon as you plugged them in so outside of it losing data when you disconnected it, especially if it's an older drive, I would look at the adapter first.

I'm sure it is the adapter. I wish it had happened sooner so I knew but I still have other drives and the cloud.

 

[lukasz.bromirski]

I'm sure it is the adapter. I wish it had happened sooner so I knew but I still have other drives and the cloud.

It's pretty obvious - any fluctuations of power, and mechanical drive would spin down... and back up in likely miliseconds. That had to shorten their lifetime. However - that 20TB Seagate - was it powered only through USB port? I'd expect not, but connection to 'misbehaving" USB may have taken its toll. With flash drives the situation should be obviously better even with flaky adapter. However if you know it's flaky - get rid of it. Also, if you want hub that's powering anything, it's safer to choose externally powered one.

 

[theladyboo]

It's pretty obvious - any fluctuations of power, and mechanical drive would spin down... and back up in likely miliseconds. That had to shorten their lifetime. However - that 20TB Seagate - was it powered only through USB port? I'd expect not, but connection to 'misbehaving" USB may have taken its toll. With flash drives the situation should be obviously better even with flaky adapter. However if you know it's flaky - get rid of it. Also, if you want hub that's powering anything, it's safer to choose externally powered one.

The 20TB had an external power adapter. I haven't used the converter since I figured out that must be it. I don't have the money to play Russian roulette with my hard drives. My hub is externally powered, but it only has a regular USB connector so I'd rather just not even bother trying. I'd hate to ruin it or the drives or the port or Mac itself. I'll just connect it to the M1 and share the drives. That will work. Unless the external drives can't be shared. I've never bothered trying.

 

[Fishrrman]

"My hub is externally powered, but it only has a regular USB connector "

What is a "regular" USB connector, as distinguished from any other USB connector?

I have an m4 Mini and it handles all my drives (most quite old) very well. From new SSDs to OLD HDDs...

I'm thinking that -- for drives which rely on USB bus power -- a POWERED USB hub is the solution.

For drives that have their own power brick (generally 3.5" platter-based HDDs), use the brick. Don't try "bus power" on those drives.

for drives with USBa plugs, get one or two of these:

Cable Matters 5Gbps USB C to USB 3.0 Adapter - 6 Inches, USBC Male to USBA Female OTG Adapter, Black

The Cable Matters USB 3.1 Type-C to Type-A adapter provides a convenient connection between the newest devices with USB Type-C and legacy USB peripherals with Type A. It adapts the Type-C port on a computer to connect all legacy equipment, peripherals, cables, hubs and chargers that ...

www.amazon.com

I don't care for those "tiny" USBa/USBc converters. Too easy to lose and I found that using one "blocks" adjacent ports...

 

[MacCheetah3]

A few points of my own experiences and observations:

• I had a streak of three Seagate spinners fail within months (i.e., each within months, replaced a couple of times) a handful of years ago. I was still using HDD for backup, namely Time Machine. Coincidentally, they were being used with an M1 Mac mini. I assumed, and still do, it was probably just bad luck (e.g., bad batch). Nonetheless, I've sworn off the Seagate branded drives for now.

• When it comes to drives, especially HDD, (the bloated) legacy support of Windows (or Linux) is still king. That is, I've resurrected several drives by writing zeroes to them using Windows CLI tools after Disk Utility would throw up its hands and spew some error code.

• The 2024 Mac mini (M4) appears to be more sensitive/limited in regard to I/O power delivery. There isn't a consensus (yet), but here's one discussion: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/m4-mac-mini-external-thunderbolt-drives-limitation.2445812/ Obviously, unexpected drive disconnections can cause corruption.