Bad Drive, Enclosure or Firewire Port?

I have a WD "Book" drive connected via a FW800<->FW400 cable to the FW800 port on my mini. After having the 10.6.3 upgrade go south on me, I'm having problems with the drive. I was able to get the mini back-up by reinstalling 10.6 and then updating through Software Update, but I'm still having troubles with the drive.
All tests give the drive a clean bill of health, but if it's connected to the machine, I cannot boot the Mini -- It starts to boot, but never doesn't get to the login screen unless I unplug the drive. I can mount the drive after login; however, eventually some application access the drive will "space out" regarding the disk access. It seems like any part of the program that's not related to the disk access (UI, other windows, etc.) will continue to work, but anything actively involved in, or waiting on the completion of the disk access will stop making progress and never complete. For example, copying files in the Finder will stall eventually (it might be after less than a dozen files, it might be after a thousand. I was able to get all the files off the drive, so it's not corrupted files/disk.
Before the upgrade troubles, I was planning on pulling the drive out and putting it in another enclosure (I'm not too happy with the WD Book enclosure), but now I'm hesitant. If the stalling problem is due to the enclosure, I'm OK; however, if it's the drive, then I'll have to buy a new drive.
My big fear is that something horked the firewire port and/or software, so attaching anything to that port will cause problems. Short of borrowing something to run on the FW800 port, is there any way to test it?
Ray

From what I've heard, the MyBook is not a drive that can be used outside the case, but is hard-wired to the enclosure.
That said, there are disk maintenance tools that can fix and repair directory structure, notify of bad sectors.
Or maybe it is cable, or FW ports, and needs to be reset.
When SL came out it seemed like there were an exceptional large number of reports of problems than would be expected, often from 'known' good brands using Oxford chipset (not sure if they were the latest, or if the latest were the very ones having trouble), but there have always been the fear that another 10.3.0 FW bug would occur.

Similar Messages

Connect 2 external drives to 1 firewire port?

MacBook Pro 5 4 Mid-2009 15"
has 1 firewire port
1 USB 2.0 port with 2 more USB 2.0 ports on an external monitor
I've been running Time Machine on a 500 GB LaCie d2 quadra external drive and need to upgrade, probably to a 3 TB drive.
To transfer my backups from the old drive to the new one, I need to connect both to the MacBook. Can I connect both in a daisy chain to the FireWire port? Or do I have to connect one via USB and the other via FireWire?
Thanks.

You can either use a FireWire hub or connect one device through USB. If either drive has two or more FireWire ports, it can act as a hub.
(121173)

Does FireWire 800 see individual drives in a four bay hard drive enclosure?

I am trying to find a four bay hard drive enclosure with FireWire 800 interface, AND through this one FW800 connection my OS can see the four hard drives individually (similar to USB interface or Port Multiplier on eSATA interface). Anyone knows whether such a product exists? Thanks.

I'm not sure you fully understand how the hardware/software RAID system functions. If you create a mirrored RAID with either then you have redundancy for drive failure. This would be the case for either hardware or software arrays. If you create a striped array with hardware or software then there is no redundancy regardless of which method you use.
An enclosure failure can occur whether you use software or hardware based arrays, so the failure risks are the same. There's no reason to believe that the failure risk of the enclosure would be greater than using software. In fact it's likely that the hardware would be more reliable. As for differences between eSATA and Firewire reliability I'm not sure why your would believe one is more reliable than the other unless you have data that supports such a conclusion.
If you are overly cautious about backups (which is a good thing) then I would look for an enclosure in which you could have two separate striped arrays. Then the two striped arrays are configured into a single mirrored array. That way you have two separate backups - a main one and the mirror. This gives both drive and data redundancy. The main risk is if one drive in each array fails simultaneously. The risk of this would be fairly low I would think. Even this risk can be removed if the box supports other types of arrays than just 0, 1, and 0-1. See the following:
RAID Basics
For basic definitions and discussion of what a RAID is and the different types of RAIDs see RAIDs. Additional discussions plus advantages and disadvantages of RAIDs and different RAID arrays see:
RAID Tutorial;
RAID Array and Server: Hardware and Service Comparison>.
Hardware or Software RAID?
RAID Hardware Vs RAID Software - What is your best option?
RAID is a method of combining multiple disk drives into a single entity in order to improve the overall performance and reliability of your system. The different options for combining the disks are referred to as RAID levels. There are several different levels of RAID available depending on the needs of your system. One of the options available to you is whether you should use a Hardware RAID solution or a Software RAID solution.
RAID Hardware is always a disk controller to which you can cable up the disk drives. RAID Software is a set of kernel modules coupled together with management utilities that implement RAID in Software and require no additional hardware.
Pros and cons
Software RAID is more flexible than Hardware RAID. Software RAID is also considerably less expensive. On the other hand, a Software RAID system requires more CPU cycles and power to run well than a comparable Hardware RAID System. Also, because Software RAID operates on a partition by partition basis where a number of individual disk partitions are grouped together as opposed to Hardware RAID systems which generally group together entire disk drives, Software RAID tends be slightly more complicated to run. This is because it has more available configurations and options. An added benefit to the slightly more expensive Hardware RAID solution is that many Hardware RAID systems incorporate features that are specialized for optimizing the performance of your system.
For more detailed information on the differences between Software RAID and Hardware RAID you may want to read: Hardware RAID vs. Software RAID: Which Implementation is Best for my Application?

HT5299 Thunderbolt-Can you use an adaptor From a thunderbolt External drive to a firewire 800/400 Mac

Thunderbolt-Can you use an adaptor From a thunderbolt External drive to a firewire 800/400 Mac

No. The Thunderbolt to Firewire adapters only work to connect a Firewire drive to a Thunderbolt port. They do not work in reverse, to connect a Thunderbolt-only drive to a Firewire port. If the only port your drive has is a Thunderbolt port and all you have on the Mac is Firewire, you can't use that drive with that computer.
Regards.

Firewire ports non-responsive

I'm hoping someone might be able to shed some light on a problem I'm having.
Both my firewire ports have power but devices fail to show in iTunes or Finder. I've tried my iPod and my Lacie hard drive with the same results.
I have done the following to try to resolve the problem.
1. reset SMU
2. reset Pram
3. did an open firmware reset (reset nvram, set defaults, reset all)
4. ran hardware test with logic board showing okay
Anyone have any thoughts or suggestions?
Thanks in advance.

FireWire ports have been known to fail. The front port on my Power Mac G5 failed and I had to get it repaired (thankfully under AppleCare at that time). Mine also provided power, but no data connection.
You have done all the things I would have tried except for one. Starting up from a different system to see if that made any difference.
If you don't already have an external drive with a bootable system on it, you can use your Mac OS X installation disc. Start up from the disc to get to Installer. At the first Installer screen (after language selection), go up to the menu bar and select to run Disk Utility, from under the Utilities menu.
Then connect your external drive to the FireWire port. See if the drive shows up in the Disk Utility sidebar. If it still does not appear, there is a good chance you have a hardware issue with the port. If it does show up now, the port is probably fine, and there is some issue with your current system installation.

"mid 2010" mac mini firewire port question

Hi all:
I have a mac mini "mid 2010" version with internal optical drive and small firewire port in between the hdmi and ethernet port...
I want to connect a firewire device via this port, but my device & existing cable are of the older style size. I see different "pin numbers" being thrown around now in terms of port size & cable types etc. so that it looks like the 'old style' port on my device is a "6 pin."
What is it that I have on my mini? I would need a ?__ pin to 6 pin cable....
tm

I've used this firewire adapter with my mini.

Startup problem with Adaptec FireWire/USB drive enclosure?

I recently acquired a Core Duo 1.66GHz mini. Soon after buying it I noticed that on startup, I get to the gray screen with Apple logo, and it freezes there for about 3-4 minutes before the spinning wheel appears briefly and then OS X starts normally.
I eventually figured out that it only does this when my Adaptec 3.5" FireWire/USB drive enclosure is connected via FireWire. If the drive is not connected the mini starts up lightning fast.
It seems to be an issue specific to the mini and this model of enclosure. I put another drive in the enclosure; same issue. I tried another enclosure I had; issue doesn't happen. I tried the Adaptec enclosure with a MacBook; issue doesn't happen. I exchanged the Adaptec enclosure for another of the same model; the issue still occurs. I even exchanged the mini for another; the issue still occurs.
Any ideas as to why this is happening and what I might do to fix it? I don't restart very often so this isn't too annoying, nonetheless I'd really love to fix it if I can.

Afraid it is all downhill from here: from what I have learnt, that drive uses a Prolific Revision A chipset. This means it cannot be used as the boot drive for your mac. http://www.ultraproducts.com/ seems to be the manufacturer and on their website forums about their enclosures detail similar issues and worse - write failures over firewire.
I cannot say much about the chipsets. Some folk swear by Oxford, which has to the best of my knowledge always supported Firewire startup. Personally, my ext hd is a Prolific Rev C and I have had no problems at all.
That all said and done, I trust that only the firewire connection is made and not the FW and USB? Also, if it is connected only via USB, are the mount problems experienced?
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

Whither firewire? looking for SATA / Firewire (1394A) drive enclosure

I still think (rather I know) that Firewire (1394A) is faster than USB, for applications like storing an external music library for iTunes.
However, I won't go so far as to say FW is being phased out but I am having a dickens of a time finding a FW enclosure.
can anyone reading this steer me to a good SATA / firewire enclosure out there? something that takes a SATA drive on the inside and connects to a firewire 1394A 400 port on the outside.
I came across this - and it says "ATA-133" - am not sure if that's P-ATA or S-ATA, as far as I know, those connectors are NOT compatible. elsewhere on the page it says IDE to FW, so maybe this unit is NOT what I need:
<http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=firewire+enclosure&cid=400903329999346 1364>
help!
w

Okay - here's the specific scenario - am intending to run iTunes from a G4 powerBook with an 80 GB internal drive.
I want to add to the library by using an external drive of roughly 200 GB, maybe more.
The only issue is that I know the larger the drive, the slower iTunes will be, the harder it will be to work in the program etc.
And it will make it even slower if part of the library is external. Since I assumed Firewire is at least somewhat faster, I wanted to go with a FW drive...
so I ask you: will it make any difference? will FW be any faster for the program than USB?
Also, I see that there are TONS of drive enclosures for SATA drives with USB ports - more than I can count - and quite a few with both USB and eSATA (I would love to use that with the powerBook, but of course it doesn't have PCI slots). Am surprised at the dearth of Firewire enclosures!
(yes, you guessed correctly, I have a number of SATA drives lying around that I wanted to re-use for this purpose...)
thanks
W

Firewire ports causing "initilaized drive" issues?

So this is now the second time this has happened to me, and since it was with a 4 day old drive I'm a little concerned (especially as it was used to recover files from ANOTHER drive that got erased...)
i just plugging in my new Western Digital 1tb Mybook Studio external drive using the FW800 and got a message saying "unable to recognize drive, initialize, cancel" etc.
Because it was new, i just hit cancel (glad I did...)
Plugged it in again, and all was fine. This had happened before a few months back with another drive only using the FW400 port.
Is there something WRONG with my Firewire ports that could be causing this? I've NEVER had an issue with USB (but these are scratch discs for video so they need to be FW). Im really concerned that this could fry my drive... which would be bad. cause i have a lot of important data on these suckers.
any ideas?

You are not alone....
My attention grabber:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1917005&tstart=0
main thread:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1910899&tstart=0

Firewire ports, USB ports, and CD/DVD drive not recognized.

I have a G3 PB with 2 FW and 2USB ports. I am running 10.2.8 with 256MB RAM. Upon starting this AM, I noticed the CD that was in my CD drive was not recognized. Nothing on the desktop. I have a 120 GB LaCie external firewire drive which was not recognized either. I tried a Lexar 2 GB thumb drive in the USB port but again nothing on the desktop. Here's what I have tried without success:
1.) Several Restarts.Drives removed during start. Hooked to different ports after restart with no sign of drive on the desktop.
2,) Resart With extensions off
3.) Zapped the PRAM
4.) Started from Systems disk and noted both external drives seen by the startup disk but thumb drive stated that it
wasn't mounted.
5.) Ran and fixed permissions on internal hard drive. Ran disk first aid. Restart again from internal drive would not recognize ports.
6.) Created a new user account hoping a fresh account would recognize the peripherals but no luck.
7.) Now wondering, if drives are seen by System install disk but not internal drive, is the OS askew in some way and if there are any tricks anyone knows to bring "sight to the blind"?
G3 PB Mac OS X (10.2.x)

How about running TechTool Deluxe (Comes on your Apple Care CD)
Also, run Repair Disk from your Install Disc one (1).
TechTool might show some things, and Repair Disk, from Disk Utilities on the install disk (1) might help repair some unknown issue.
Another also, (Try after the afore mentioned, and/or before run Disk utility to see if the thumb drives mount in the Drives column) from your App./utilities/disk utilities.
Hope these steps help.
L+
eMac 1.25 Ghz superdrive 2GB RAM Mac OS X (10.3.9)

My external hard drive and cd burner does not appear on the desktop of my mini. Using Firewire adapter from old to new firewire ports.

I have a new Mac Mini (2013) and older external hard drive (Lacie) and cd reader/burner (EzQuest). Both have the original Firewire ports and the Mini has the new kind. I bought a cable with both kinds of ends but I plug them in and they don't show on the desktop.

From what I've heard, sometimes certain devices will not have full functionality if they are FireWire 400 with an 800 adapter. Take Apple's original iSight external webcam. It had FireWire 400, and people report using a converter cable will give them video, but not audio.
When I first got my mini, my usb cd burner wasn't recognised by Finder or Disk Utility. After repairing disk permissions and a reboot, it worked fine.

External drive enclosure, USB 2 mounts, firewire invisible!

I have a venus ds3 external enclosure with a 300GB 7200rpm WD hard drive inside it. The enclosure works fine with windows and usb2, and it is also detected and mounted on usb2 on my mini (1.25ghz ppc mini). However, nothing happens when I try to use the firewire connection on the mini. In system profiler, I see:
FireWire Device Tree
FireWire Bus
Unknown Device
It is an oxford fw911 chipset, and I did run the updater to FW911V4_00_0000Release.bin, but still no firewire action. The updater saw the enclosure via firewire on my mac, but os x will not see the drive itself.
Am I doomed to using usb2? Would it still be possible to boot from this drive on usb2 instead of firewire?
mac mini Mac OS X (10.4.7) upgraded to 512MB ram

problem is
you cannot use 300 gigs as fire wire on any mac mini
the max you can use is only 200 gigs before mac os x
no longer recongnizes the drive
so you need a 200 gig hard drive sorry
Is there some documentation that you could cite on the 200gb barrier?
I'm also interested if it's a ppc-mini only problem or if it affects other systems as well.
I have a 250gig firewire drive on my wife's intel mac mini
and it works fine. Even if it only regognized on 200gig and
I didn't notice, it mounted and worked.
I now have it partitioned into 2 samller volumes. So, if it's
a problem on the PPC mac, then he should be able to
partition the drive and make it work.
I just now tried partitioning it again via usb, and made two 137gb partitions (or whatever odd number it came out to be), and it was still not recognized when I switched over to firewire.
If it turns out that john was right, and nothing over 200gb will work, can I still get some use out of the drive? Can I install applications on it or move the swap files over to it?
mac mini Mac OS X (10.4.7) upgraded to 512MB ram

I have just upgraded from a Macbook to a Macbook Air. I have been using a iomega external hard drive for Time Machine, which use a Firewire. However, Macbook Air's do not have a Firewire port and i cannot find an adaptor anywhere. Can anyone help?? Thanks

I have just upgraded from a Macbook to a Macbook Air. I have been using a iomega external hard drive for Time Machine, which use a Firewire. However, Macbook Air's do not have a Firewire port and i cannot find an adaptor anywhere. Can anyone help?? Thanks

There has never been a reliable firewire ---> USB adapter suitable for external high speed storage. This was a major issue when the MacBooks lost the firewire port a number of years ago (Apple subsequently brought it back).
The only high speed port on the Air is the ThunderBolt port. There are external ThunderBolt drive options out there, but they're somewhat more expensive than traditional USB/FireWire options.

Can't daisy-chain Firewire drives reliably from 1-port Powerbook. Hub??

I have found that I cannot get a daisy-chained Firewire drive to mount more than 50% of the time. This problem doesn't happen with Tiger with the same drives. I have tried 4 different brands of late-model Firewire drives (Iomega, Smartdisk, Maxtor, and Seagate) with different cables and what happens is that a drive that is directly attached to the 12" Powerbook will mount, but the second chained drive fails to mount a majority of the time. Since I only have one Firewire port, this is preventing me from using more than one drive at a time, and I lost two Firewire drives to corruption today. Three out of four partitions lost contained bootable backups of Leopard and Tiger. Ouch!
This issue could prevent from using Leopard with my Powerbook, which is supposed to be Leopard-compatible. I can't remake the clones too easily with only being able to attach one drive at a time. I am thinking I will order a Firewire hub and try that, but I am not sure if that would be a solution, and I am wondering why I can always daisy-chain under Tiger, and not under Leopard. Does anyone have experience with Firewire hubs and Firewire operation details? Will I be able to get reliable Firewire with a hub?

I have exactly the same problem !
I have found this :
Using Multiple FireWire Devices at the Same Time
Power Macintosh computers can transfer perfect digital video (DV) on FireWire when no other devices are using the FireWire bus. If you have problems transferring digital video, make certain that no other FireWire devices are being used at the same time. Turning on a DV camera that is already connected may cause a FireWire hard disk to stop working. If this happens, turn off the camera and verify that the hard disk has recovered. Then unplug the FireWire cable from the camera, turn the camera on, and reconnect the FireWire cable to the camera. Check with the hard disk vendor for a possible firmware update to prevent this problem.
here:
http://www.2ndwave.com/firewire.asp
At the moment I can't upset what I'm doing to test it but I intend to do that as soon as I finish copying transferring...
I have the following device attached to different firewire ports:
a firewire video device connecting my G5 Desktop to the TV screen
a firewire ibot
I thought I would give u a head start

External drive- is firewire 800 drive compatible w/ PBook g4 firewire port

I need to buy an external hard drive. Will this model connect to my PowerBook G4 which is about 3 years old without any additional upgrading of the firewire ports? (G-Tech G-DRIVE mini 120GB FW800 Portable Hard Drive)
Would this drive be more beneficial than the firewire 400 drive for transfering movies from my HD camcorder to disk?
powerbook g4 Mac OS X (10.0.x)

Hi, freestoner, and welcome to Apple Discussions. Your FireWire ports can't be upgraded, so check with the manufacturer of the drive as to its compatibility with FireWire 400 ports, or else buy a FireWire 800 CardBus adapter.
If you need to buy a CardBus adapter for the drive, make sure that either the drive or the adapter card has its own power supply. The CardBus slot won't supply enough power to run a hard drive that depends on bus power.

Bad Drive, Enclosure or Firewire Port?

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