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USB Drive Problem

jcook793

jcook793

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 18, 2003
134
17
Cincinnati, OH
I have an external USB 2.0 enclosure with 2 drives. One of them is unformatted, one is formatted FAT32 and works fine with my Windows laptop. When I plug the drive into my Mac it mounts fine, but trying to access the folder via Finder freezes the whole computer to the point where I have to reboot.

I searched the forums and couldn't find much about it. Anyone else have this problem?

Thanks,
John
 
Yeah, the FAT32 one. I would format it, but then I'd lose 20 gigs of data. :D I may copy everything off and try that though.

I just fiddled with it again, the Disk Utility app verifies that everything is OK with the drive. And I can see the contents of the root folder, I just can't do much else.

Argh.
 
If it's not too much trouble getting the 20GB of data from it then I think reformatting it may be the best way of fixing it, assuming it's not a bad drive, enclosure or USB port. :)
 
I assume the drive is good since it works on a Windows laptop. I've tried a couple of different USB ports so I don't think that's it... I hope it's not some conflict with the drive's controller, but it's styled like a G5 so I would think that the guts are compatible.

I'm copying the data now... According to Windows "10 Minutes Remaining" but who knows when it will really be done.
 
I'm starting to think this case will never work with a Mac.

When I plug it into the USB port, the blue light comes on. It takes a few seconds, but finally the drives are mounted. I can copy small files (< 64k) just fine. Anything bigger than that (which brings up that little progress bar window) and the light goes out. Finder won't respond until I unplug the drive.

After this happens I can plug the drive back into the USB port and the blue light will come on, but the Mac can't see it. If I turn the drive's power off and then back on, I can start back at square one.

The blue light also goes off when I try to delete the old partition (trying to format it on the Mac). The Disk Utility freezes up just like Finder until I unplug the drive.

I've been able to reproduce this on my G5 and my old G4 iBook. Again, this enclosure works fine on my work Dell laptop.

My enclosure is an AddLogix (formerly CompuCable) FireXpress Dual USB. I've Googled around and seen a couple of mentions of firmware upgrades but I can't locate a download.

Has anyone had problems with this enclosure? Should I just toss it and get another one?

Thanks,
John
 
I remember somebody on this forum using an externally powered USB hub for his USB drive and it took care of his strange problems. I guess some drive enclosures sink a bit too much power through their USB connection, even if they have their own power supplies.
 
The powered USB hub sounded promising so I gave it a whirl. No-go.

I've sent an email to Addlogix support, we'll see if I ever hear back from them.

Thanks,
John
 
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