OWC Data Doubler on mid 2012 Macbook Pro issue, please help...

[dmrphy03]

So I installed the OWC Data Doubler in my mid 2012 MBP last night and got everything setup and transferred. A quick overview of my setup...i put a 250GB Samsung 840 series SSD in the actual hd slot on the MBP and a 1TB hdd (pulled it from the seagate srd00f1 external portable drive) into the optical slot via OWC Data Doubler. The 1TB drive shows to be USB 2.0/3.0 and it's a 5400 rpm drive so it should completely compatible with my setup, correct?

Now my issue...everything was working great until i put a decent load on the hdd. The hdd turned off completely and the "drive not ejected properly" message popped up on my screen, while removing the drive from my sidebar as an option all together. I restarted the MBP and everything went back to normal with the drive showing back up and being usable. Tried putting a load on it again and it did the exact same thing...what gives? It seems to run perfectly during normal operation, its just when i perform a labor intensive job (i.e. transferring multiple large files while watching a movie on the same drive) that it happens.

Any ideas or input you smarter guys on here can give? Just fyi, i had a 750gb drive in the slot beforehand with out any issues at all...

 

[dmrphy03]

Im going to try a different size hd (same exact one from the seagate portable, but 2tb instead) and see what happens.

Any known input on this issue would be so much appreciated! Ive looked and looked for answers to only be lead to dead ends...

 

[Weaselboy]

Just an idea.... sometimes the drives in those preconfigured external enclosures like that use non-standard firmware designed to work with that specific enclosure. I wonder if that might be what is causing your issue.

 

[awests]

Have you tried completely erasing and reformatting the 1TB drive via disk utility?

 

[Mike Boreham]

So I installed the OWC Data Doubler in my mid 2012 MBP last night and got everything setup and transferred. A quick overview of my setup...i put a 250GB Samsung 840 series SSD in the actual hd slot on the MBP and a 1TB hdd (pulled it from the seagate srd00f1 external portable drive) into the optical slot via OWC Data Doubler. The 1TB drive shows to be USB 2.0/3.0 and it's a 5400 rpm drive so it should completely compatible with my setup, correct?

Now my issue...everything was working great until i put a decent load on the hdd. The hdd turned off completely and the "drive not ejected properly" message popped up on my screen, while removing the drive from my sidebar as an option all together. I restarted the MBP and everything went back to normal with the drive showing back up and being usable. Tried putting a load on it again and it did the exact same thing...what gives? It seems to run perfectly during normal operation, its just when i perform a labor intensive job (i.e. transferring multiple large files while watching a movie on the same drive) that it happens.

Any ideas or input you smarter guys on here can give? Just fyi, i had a 750gb drive in the slot beforehand with out any issues at all...

The problem may be the well known problem of 6G devices in MBP optical bay (google this for more). 2011 machines definitely suffered this, and some 2012 machines. Loads of threads on this. If this is your problem you need to put a 3G drive in the optical. Some 6G drives can be converted to 3G.

 

[dmrphy03]

Just an idea.... sometimes the drives in those preconfigured external enclosures like that use non-standard firmware designed to work with that specific enclosure. I wonder if that might be what is causing your issue.

Good thought, never considered that, may very well be the case; however, i tried the 2tb drive from the exact same type of external with no issues yet. Doesnt mean its fixed tho, haha. Thanks for the input!

Have you tried completely erasing and reformatting the 1TB drive via disk utility?

I did try that a couple times, forgot to mention it, thanks for the help though!

The problem may be the well known problem of 6G devices in MBP optical bay (google this for more). 2011 machines definitely suffered this, and some 2012 machines. Loads of threads on this. If this is your problem you need to put a 3G drive in the optical. Some 6G drives can be converted to 3G.

I did read a little about this when doing my research; however, wouldnt the fact that its a usb 2.0(3g)/3.0(6g) compatible hdd prevent that from being the case? Seems to me it would just stay at 3g, no? Thanks for your input!

As stated above, i replaced the 1tb with a 2tb hdd from the exact same brand external enclosure (both samsung drives that came out of seagate external enclosures, but this ones model number is not in line with the 1tb if that makes sense) and it has worked perfectly so far. Tried some labor intensive jobs early this morning and couldnt get it to freeze up or shut down so we will just have to see how it holds up. Thanks again for all the info and help!

 

[Mike Boreham]

I did read a little about this when doing my research; however, wouldnt the fact that its a usb 2.0(3g)/3.0(6g) compatible hdd prevent that from being the case? Seems to me it would just stay at 3g, no? Thanks for your input!

Unfortunately not. Yes all 6G devices are backwards compatible with 3G and will work fine in a 3G connection. The problem here is that the optical bay of 2011/2012 optical bays is not a 3G connection. It is actually a 6G port, but it doesn't work properly at 6G. If it really was a true 3G, port backward compatibility would apply and it it would be fine. Apple only intended it to have a 1.5G burner in it and it doesn't have adequate shielding to support 6G reliably.

At one time I had a 2011 MBP with a 6G optical port and a 2010 MBP with a 3G optical port. The 2010 machine was quite happy with 6G devices in the optical, at 3G speed, but the 2011 machine was not.

As I said the problem was largely sorted in 2012 models but I think some 2012 machines still had the problem.