Macbook pro + lacie 1 TB HDD Neil Poulton = no good?

[alvinjc]

Hi, I'm new here

I have a lacie 1 TB HDD (USB version) plugged to my MBP. It works wonderfull for... about 4-6 months and suddenly about 2 weeks ago, Mac OS doesn't recognise the HDD properly (i have 2 partitions, FAT32 and Mac extended) it only mount the FAT32 partition and did not mount the Mac extended partition. Tried repairing the partition using disk utility, didn't work. Swapped with another USB cable, no luck. Finally googled and found out that I had to reset the bus in the MBP (turn off, release battery and power for 15 mins). Worked for a couple of times, but not lately.

Need help... I don't want to format the HDD if possible since I don't have a spare 1 TB. And I love the idea that I can just plug in the HDD without shutting down and wait for 15 mins to just access my ext hdd.

Thanks in advance for the help

MBP 3,1 (non unibody), 2.4 GHz C2D, 4GB memory, 160 GB 7200 rpm.

 

[phixiuz]

You probably haven't ejected the drive properly. About half a year ago I made the switch to Apple (more specifically OSX) and OSX seems very unforgiven if it comes to not properly ejecting external HD's, never had any problems under Windows and didn't eject most of the time. I myself already had one totally corrupted drive by ejecting it while a movie was playing. I tried everything I could to restore it but to no avail. And few weeks ago I forgot to eject it properly aswell and lost a whole directory of files. Both where formatted NTFS, so that might have been the problem aswell (first time I was using Paragon, this time NTFS-3G).

Now I exclusively use Mac OS X Extended and Macdrive on Windows trying to reduce these risks of losing data... it seems to work. But I think FAT32 is safer than NTFS since it's default integrated in OSX?

 

[FnuGk]

i have the same ext hdd (1tb lacie by niel pluton) but it only have the default partition (running ntfs as i use a windows machine). I have never ever released it and i have never had any trouble. Though i rarely plug it out as it is connected to a stationary pc. I have however had an issue a while back where it all by it self disconnected and the reconnected 5 secs later as someone pulled the plug and stuck it back in.

I also have a wd 750gb ext hdd that is getting quite old but it seems quite rough as the drive have survived several falls to the extend where the casing have trouble fitting in place and the display no longer works. In one fall i was loading a game while listing to music all on that drive, my friend pushing stuff on the table back sending the drive flying so far it pulls the plug :S but its still running like the day i bought it I guess wd makes some reliable drives that just happens to have a too high gravity point.