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New Seagate Backup Plus 4TB portable USB 3 Hard Drive takes long to mount on my mac pro

S

Sossity

macrumors 65816
Original poster
May 12, 2010
1,360
32
Why is this? I noticed that with my other Seagte Backup plus slim 2TB portable hard drive, it mounts right away, but this one takes a good few minutes before it will mount. When I first plug it into my mac pro via usb, I can hear a faint high pitched sort of squeaking sound while it is mounting, and stops when it has mounted.

I tried doing a fresh reformat in disk utility, to make it just a single partition, and remove the bloatware off it, but this did not seem to help.

It is a usb 3 powered drive connected my classic mid 2010 mac pro running mavericks.
 
Sossity said:
Why is this? I noticed that with my other Seagte Backup plus slim 2TB portable hard drive, it mounts right away, but this one takes a good few minutes before it will mount. When I first plug it into my mac pro via usb, I can hear a faint high pitched sort of squeaking sound while it is mounting, and stops when it has mounted.

I tried doing a fresh reformat in disk utility, to make it just a single partition, and remove the bloatware off it, but this did not seem to help.

It is a usb 3 powered drive connected my classic mid 2010 mac pro running mavericks.
Click to expand...

Hmm, it's possible that the drive might be failing. This shouldn't take long to check, so it's worth getting that out of the way, and then we can check a few more things.

Download SATSMARTDriver here to enable external SMART monitoring for OS X, and restart your Mac.

Then download SMART Utility here to check the SMART data. Does the external drive show as failing or OK?
 
Sossity said:
Yes, it showed as passing
Click to expand...

OK, that's good news.

Do you have it running through a USB hub, or directly into the Mac? Do the issues persist no matter which USB port you use? Also, is the USB cable removable or built into the dock? If it's removable/detachable, you can possibly try a different USB cable.

Finally, does the portable drive have an option for mains power, or does it run through bus power (USB) only?

Best wishes and speak with you soon.
 
keysofanxiety said:
OK, that's good news.

Do you have it running through a USB hub, or directly into the Mac? Do the issues persist no matter which USB port you use? Also, is the USB cable removable or built into the dock? If it's removable/detachable, you can possibly try a different USB cable.

Finally, does the portable drive have an option for mains power, or does it run through bus power (USB) only?

Best wishes and speak with you soon.
Click to expand...

I have it connected directly into my mac, into one of the usb ports on the front. Cable is removable, it runs through usb only, it is a portable type hard drive.
 
Sossity said:
I have it connected directly into my mac, into one of the usb ports on the front. Cable is removable, it runs through usb only, it is a portable type hard drive.
Click to expand...

OK. It may be worth trying a different USB port to see if the issue persists, just to diagnose. I'm not sure what USB cable it uses, but it's probably USB mini/micro rather than being proprietary.

You can also check for firmware updates here: http://www.seagate.com/gb/en/support/external-hard-drives/desktop-hard-drives/backup-plus-desk-mac/

Towards the bottom, there should be an option to find firmware updates based on your serial number (as there are a fair few different models), to ensure you're downloading the correct update.

32467.png


Is it still under warranty? It may be worth speaking with Seagate support too.
 
keysofanxiety said:
OK. It may be worth trying a different USB port to see if the issue persists, just to diagnose. I'm not sure what USB cable it uses, but it's probably USB mini/micro rather than being proprietary.

You can also check for firmware updates here: http://www.seagate.com/gb/en/support/external-hard-drives/desktop-hard-drives/backup-plus-desk-mac/

Towards the bottom, there should be an option to find firmware updates based on your serial number (as there are a fair few different models), to ensure you're downloading the correct update.

View attachment 637519

Is it still under warranty? It may be worth speaking with Seagate support too.
Click to expand...

Went to the site, typed in the serial number, and I got red text saying there was no firmware found for this serial number
 
Sossity said:
Went to the site, typed in the serial number, and I got red text saying there was no firmware found for this serial number
Click to expand...

OK. Other than verifying through a different USB port and trying a different cable, I'm afraid I don't have any other ideas for how to diagnose the problem, or what could be causing the issue. It may be worth speaking with Seagate support?

Apologies I couldn't be of more assistance.
 
keysofanxiety said:
OK. Other than verifying through a different USB port and trying a different cable, I'm afraid I don't have any other ideas for how to diagnose the problem, or what could be causing the issue. It may be worth speaking with Seagate support?

Apologies I couldn't be of more assistance.
Click to expand...
oh, no, you have been helpful, and thank you
 
Sossity said:
Why is this? I noticed that with my other Seagte Backup plus slim 2TB portable hard drive, it mounts right away, but this one takes a good few minutes before it will mount. When I first plug it into my mac pro via usb, I can hear a faint high pitched sort of squeaking sound while it is mounting, and stops when it has mounted.

I tried doing a fresh reformat in disk utility, to make it just a single partition, and remove the bloatware off it, but this did not seem to help.

It is a usb 3 powered drive connected my classic mid 2010 mac pro running mavericks.
Click to expand...

Certainly isn't normal. I've got a 4TB Seagate connected right now and it mounts as fast as any external HDD I have. Contact Seagate for a replacement, not sure there's much else you can do.
 
Yeah get a replacement, and i don't believe there is any way to check SMART status via USB, i don't think USB is able to provide that type of data anyway.
 
I just recently got another one, replacement, and it is the same; it takes a good 3-5 minutes to show up in finder or my desktop, I launch disk utility, and the upper hard drive name shows up, but the lower name I gave it is sort of greyed out while it is trying to mount, so it seems it it sort of halfway does for a couple of minutes then it does.

I wonder if it has anything to do with my setup, I am on a classic mac pro running mavericks 10.9.5, and am connecting the hard drive to the front USB port, I know this has only usb 2 ports, and the hard drives are usb 3, maybe there is something happening there.
 
Really shouldn't be. How many USB devices do you have connected?
When was the last time you updated your OS?
How much RAM?

Id say try a partition with a clean OS and see if the same issue occurs. otherwise it just might be your Mac in general.
 
Yeah and especially with USB/Externals its not always accurate. Not that SMART is always accurate either way.
 
Lately I've found that the paragon NTFS app on my Mac seems to be messing about with finder mounting the HDD. I press mount in disk utility and nothing happens.i open up ntfs and press mount and it appears!
 
Last edited:
OP --

Is the drive in HFS+ format?
Or... something else?

Have you tried a USB3 card in the Mac Pro?
 
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