Firewire devices connect3ed across power transitions

Possible dumb question...
I've just about filled my iMac's internal HD so need to add an external drive. I have used Firewire drives for some time for backup use only (always connecting after the iMac is on, always unmount before powering down).
I recall years back there were issues with having FW drives connected when powering up or down, is this still an issue? I am looking at a LaCie drive which has some sort of auto power feature so the drive will turn on and off with my iMac...is this safe? What about "portable" drives that are powered by the USB port itself?

Yes, could be mid 2009 -it's one of the earlier unibody Macbook Pros (15" 2.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo) so I guess 5 years service is pretty good.
Unfortunately I don't have the original DVD with me, I'm in Arctic Norway about to board a ship.Before I go and while I'm still online, is there any third party diagnostic software that I can download to trouble-shoot the hardware or a set of commands I can enter into the terminal?
I forgot to mention in the long list of things already tried above, I've repaired permissions on both start up disks. Running out of things I can try.
Maybe in the future (if it is hardware failure) I could use a firewire pc card to get some firewire connectivity back.
USB still works fine and will get me through this trip s l o w l y ;-)
Thanks for the help

Similar Messages

  • Anyone able to mount more than 3 firewire devices on their Alum 2.4 imac?

    Hi.
    I can't power up more than 3 firewire devices or my imac kicks everything off. I have 2 Lacie 1T drives piggybacked on the 800 port and then a powered firewire hub plugged into the 400 port. I can have either another firewire external HD OR an external Cd/Dvd recorder plugged into the hub. If I try both (or any combination of 2 firewire devices) - the imac kicks everything off firewire, both on the 800 port and the 400 port. All my devices have their own external power supply. It also doesn't matter how I chain the drives. I can have 3 on the 800 port but then nothing on the 800 port.
    This is a bummer for me. I migrated from a Dual G5 2GB with 4 external HDs and an 2nd external DVD writer attached. My drives are 2 1Ts, a 800 GB and a 400 GB. I do a lot of photography and video editing so I really need the external space. I guess this imac really isn't a "Pro" model but I didn't need any more speed and I wanted to save space and money. And I love the 24" screen. I think Apple should say up-front if there are significant limits to the imac's Firewire capabilities.
    Are any of you you able to attach 4 firewire devices at one time? If so, then I guess my machine is defective and I'll start working with Apple on exchanging it. Please let me know.
    Thanks

    I think you should be able to do much more than 4 - I believe the theoretical maximum is somewhere at 20+ devices (if they are self-powered). I don't have a 24inch but instead a 20 inch but I'm running three HDs and one DVD drive and in fact, all daisy-chained onto one single firewire port on the Mac. Do your external drives have two ports or just one? In the former case, you might want to try skipping the hub and just daisy-chaining them. I've never owned a firewire hub so I don;t know if they can be touchy but you might want to give it a shot.
    Andrew

  • Trying to use FireWire devices with a W540 through a Thunderbolt adapter

    We have a camera that we need to use that has FireWire 800 as its sole interface, and because it needs to be mobile we had to use it with a laptop.  After some research we decided that the best course of action was to purchase a ThinkPad W540 and connect the camera to the Thunderbolt port with a Thunderbolt to FireWire Adapter, as this should give us plenty of bandwidth for the camera. 
    Unfortunately, we haven't been able to connect any FireWire devices to the laptop in this way.  We have tried connecting both the camera and a FireWire hard drive through the adapter, and while the power lights will come on for both devices the computer resolutely refuses to even acknowledge their existance. 
    I have tried everything that I can think of to get this to work, updating all of the dirvers on the laptop, checking all of the settings in the BIOS, and searching the forums for similar issues, but now I have run out of ideas.  What can I do to get this laptop to play nice with my FireWire devices?
    Solved!
    Go to Solution.

    Good afternoon and welcome to the community.
    Sorry you're having issues using a Thunderbolt-2-Firewire adapter.
    Not much I can offer on that as I've never used one, but an alternative might be to try an Expresscard Firewire adapter. A number of them I've seen offer 2 ports, so that might be useful also.
    Regards.
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  • The FIX for FireWire Devices not being found.

    If you have FireWire devices connected to your iMac that are no longer being recognized, this post is for you.
    1. Power off your iMac
    2. Unplug all USB and Firewire cables from the iMac.
    3. Unplug the iMac from the main power.
    4. Wait 4 minutes
    5. Reconnect and power on.
    6. Devices will be found as you'd normally expect.
    Somehow, four minutes without any kind of power resets the Firewire interface so that it will work again.

    1. Power off your iMac
    2. Unplug all USB and Firewire cables from the iMac.
    3. Unplug the iMac from the main power.
    4. Wait 4 minutes
    5. Reconnect and power on.
    6. Devices will be found as you'd normally expect.
    On step five, you say 'reconnect and power on'. Does this mean I should turn on my external device and connect before I turn the iMac on?
    As for my ports being blown, I don't think that's the problem for me. My iPod easily mounts on firewire. And this device mounts on my other machines that use 10.3 panther.
    Sorry if it sounds like I'm trying to hyjack this topic, it sounds like you've got a good method and I want to utilize it properly!
    Thanks,
    ben

  • If your Mac suddenly looses Firewire devices, here's one cure...

    Since we FCP people use a lot of external Firewire drives, this might be useful.
    If your Mac suddenly looses Firewire devices, try this. (I got this from LukeA on the iLounge forums.)
    Shut off your Mac for at least 10 minutes. Then reset the P-RAM (whatever that is) by holding these keys on startup: Cmd + Opt + P + R - until the Mac chimes a few times.
    My Mac Mini suddenly stopped recognizing any external Firewire drives. I thought the port had probably blown on the computer, and was about to buy a new iMac, but I tried this as a last resort. It worked!
    Now I don't get my new iMac! ****!

    I got this from LukeA on the iLounge forums
    Just so you'll know, Apple has a ton of articles and how-to's right on this website (just click the Support link above and do a search). Other common Firewire problems can also be addressed by resetting the PMU (Power Management Unit) button: http://search.info.apple.com/?search=Go&lr=lang_en&kword=&type=&newstype=&q=pmu
    This one os specific to the MacMini: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300574
    -DH

  • 10.4.6 -- no firewire devices show-up

    I upgraded to 10.4.6 on Sunday and everything was fine until this morning. Now, no firewire devices will appear (I have an iSight and two external drives).
    Please, please, please help!!!
    Thank you.

    From MacFixIt, regarding inability to see FireWire devices after upgrading to 10.4.6:
    "We should note that various FireWire issues can be caused by outdated firmware. Run Software Update and make sure there are no firmware updates available for your Mac.
    Also, as with previous instances of this issue, some users have reported success by performing a hardware reset that involves holding down the power key for 10 seconds or so while the system is off."
    If those suggestions fail, and you used Software Update to go to 10.4.6, you might try downloading the Mac OS X Combo Updater for PPC and applying it.
    Bob N.
    Mac Mini 1.5 GHz; iBook 900 mHz; iPod 20 GB   Mac OS X (10.4.5)  

  • I cannot connect any firewire device.

    When I go to firewire on the profiler it returns "warning, unable to list Firewire devices." Any ideas?

    OK,
    It looks like you have one of the original Intel iMacs, an early 2006 model. What I first try to do is a SMC reset, please follow:
    SMC RESET
    Shut down the computer.
    Unplug the computer's power cord and ALL peripherals.
    Wait 15 seconds.
    Attach the computers power cable.
    Wait another 5 seconds and press the power button to turn on the computer.
    PRAM RESET
    Shut down the computer.
    Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
    Turn on the computer.
    Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys. You must press this key combination before the gray screen appears.
    Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
    Release the keys.

  • FireWire Bus:    Warning:     Unable to list FireWire devices.

    How do I fix this on my older G5
    FireWire Bus:
    Warning:          Unable to list FireWire devices.
    Trying to use my sony DCR HC-30
    Use to work

    Hi try this...
    reset FW bus, same goes for USB reset...
    Reset the Firewire bus
    If your Firewire or USB isn't recognizing any device.  A solution which has worked for some whose hard drive became invisible in 10.4 was simply to follow these four steps to reset the Firewire/USB bus:
    1. Shut the machine down.
    2. UNPLUG the power lead to the computer and any firewire/USB drive or devices.
    3. leave it for 10 minutes.
    4. Connect back up and reboot.
    http://www.macmaps.com/firewirebug2.html

  • Can I connect two firewire devices?

    Ideally, I need two firewire devices running at the same time: One camera to capture footage and one firewire external hard disk for the media files (about 160 GB).
    a) I've been told that I need a firewire external disc, because a USB hard disk would slow down the editing in Final Cut. Is this true?
    b) If so, can I connect two firewire devices to my MBP (74.53 GB internal hard disk), which has only one 400 Firewire port?

    1. Yes, FireWire is faster than USB. However, it would be better to edit on your main hard drive. Use the external drive just for storage and backup.
    2. You can chain up to 255 FireWire devices provided the total power requirements did not exceed the port's capabilities. A single FireWire drive and a camera shouldn't be a problem. However, you should know that some FireWire cameras may not play well with other FireWire devices. If you find apparent problems when both are connected to the port, then you may need to use each separately. In this case you may need to put the hard drive on a USB port while the camera is connected to the FireWire port unless the camera also supports transfers on USB 2.0.

  • OK to connect a firewire device to two computers?

    Is it OK to connect a firewire device to two computers? I have a DVD burner sitting between two computers that I have been connecting to each of the computers, but it just occurred that it might be OK to connect it to both of them at once. What about connecting a firewire hard drive to two computers at once?

    John Link wrote:
    I'm actually more interested in connecting a DVD burner with two firewire ports to two computers. Is this connection possible?
    It might be possible, at least from a connection standpoint the Firewire standard is such that doing so won't create any smoke and sparks. I don't see any harm in trying as long as you've taken precautions to back up your important data, which you ought to do anyway.
    Roxio Toast has a feature that enables you to share a burner across a network. That might be more in line with what you want to accomplish. This excerpt is from Toast Titanium:
    The ToastAnywhere feature helps you share CD, DVD, HD DVD, and Blu-ray recorders across a network or the Internet with other users. An entire office or home network can use a single recorder.
    Toast Titanium doesn't address sharing a burner over FireWire. Perhaps for that you'll have to wait for Toast ReardenMetal.

  • Firewire device not being detected

    Hi! First time here, and hoping for some wise counsel! I have an audio control interface (M-Audio Project Mix I/O)running from my G5 via Firewire connection.
    Following a brief power interuption, during which both device and Mac were 'on', the power was immediately restored, and I had to restart the Mac, but the Project Mix came back on with the power. Since this my Mac won't detect the control interface (I've reloaded the software and tried to re-establish the link through the software but no joy).
    The M-Audio support site has a warning about permanent damage being caused to Firewire ports through 'hot-plugging' and I'm beginning to wonder if this may be the case here when the power was disrupted and then immediately restored.
    How can I tell if this has happened? And if it has, can I do anything about it?
    HELP!!!!
    Thanks in advance to anyone who can advise! Bill

    billnw1-
    Try the ubiquitous SMU reset and see if that helps.
    This document about what to do if your computer won't recognize a FireWire device may be helpful.
    Luck-
    -DaddyPaycheck

  • Firewire problem - (unable to list firewire device)

    I plugged my newly purchased WD external harddisk into the iMac fw 400 port and nothing shows. I've tried to connect it with MBP and everything is working fine.
    I checked the Console and it display the following message :
    01/09/2009 3:53:40 PM SystemUIServer[1648] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 3:54:18 PM System Profiler[1750] SPFWR ERROR: FireWire bus may be unstable. Other FireWire devices may be present.
    01/09/2009 4:24:56 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 4:31:22 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 4:36:30 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 4:38:26 PM System Profiler[109] SPFWR ERROR: FireWire bus may be unstable. Other FireWire devices may be present.
    01/09/2009 4:48:03 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 4:49:12 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 4:57:04 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 4:57:37 PM System Profiler[110] SPFWR ERROR: FireWire bus may be unstable. Other FireWire devices may be present.
    01/09/2009 5:13:23 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    01/09/2009 5:18:14 PM System Profiler[110] SPFWR ERROR: FireWire bus may be unstable. Other FireWire devices may be present.
    01/09/2009 5:27:44 PM SystemUIServer[74] ICANotifications framework timed out waiting for a FireWire device with GUID '40718943393659308' to become ready!
    In the system profiler it said "unable to list firewire device"
    I've tried the following method:
    reset pram
    unplug the power cord and wait for 30 mins and reboot
    and they couldn't solve the problem.
    Could anyone solve this?
    Thanks

    First thing to do is reset the FW chip set on the mother board. Unfortunately, when you power down the computer there is always a bit of power still applied to the motherboard to keep things alive and this usually includes the ports to do stuff like detect when a device wants to wake up the computer. The downside of this is when a bus/port chipset goes into a weird state, locks up, etc., simply power cycling (shutdown & restart) the computer won't work.
    So first thing to try is resetting the chipset and to do this you have to power down the computer and completely unplug the computer from the wall power (unplug the power cord to your Mac). Also unplug everything from the Mac's ports (USB, FW, Ethernet, etc.) to make sure no parasitic power is still there to keep the chipset alive. Now let it sit for a minute (give those big power caps in there time to discharge). Now plug the power cord back in, plug in ONLY the keyboard and mouse, start up the Mac. Now plug in accessories/hard-drives and see if your FW ports and the drive work any better.
    Best of luck!
    Patrick
    Reference articles:
    What to do if your computer won't recognize a FireWire or USB device
    http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1317?viewlocale=en_US
    USB and FireWire Quick Assist
    http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1151?viewlocale=en_US

  • Stumped: PM G5 FireWire Bus--Unable to list FireWire Devices

    I have a nearly four year old Power Mac G5. My firewire ports were working fine a month ago before 10.5.8. Today I went to hookup my video camera to download some tape into iMovie '09 and it did not recognize the camera. A quick check of system profiler:
    Warning: Unable to list FireWire devices.
    I have tried the following to fix in this order:
    1. Reset Pram (commandoption+PR)
    2. Reset Devices by (commandoption+OF)
    reset-nvram
    set-defaults
    reset-all
    3. Repaired Permissions
    4. Reset PRAM
    5. Reinstalled 10.5.8 combo installer
    I still cannot get the firewire bus to work. I am open to ideas. Someone suggested removing the PRAM battery but I have been unable to figure out how to do that.

    I ended up unplugging computer for 5 minutes and re-plugging in and this seems to have solved problem (although I do not know why.)

  • Firewire problem (the old 'Warning: unable to list firewire devices')

    Hello everyone,
    I am having a very big problem with my 13" Macbook Pro since yesterday. I took it to work and hooked it to a RME Fireface 800 audio interface we have in there, and for some odd reason it didn't recognize the interface. After a few tries, it suddenly came alive. I did the recording session as usual, turned the notebook off and brought everything home. Today, I hooked it to my own RME Fireface 400, and one of the firewire ports on it wasn't working - I plugged on the other and started audio playback. After a few minutes, the audio stopped and the host connection problem led the Fireface has turned on. AFter this, I couldn't get the fireface to be recognize on its own - more on this later.
    I went to system profiler and got a 'WARNING: Unable to list firewire devices' message. I already googled it and it seems I am not the only own having this problem. I already clean PRAM, SMC, ran disk utility to repair disk and disk permissions and nothing has worked. HOWEVER, one external HD (firewire) i have is working just fine on this same firewire interface. I also tried daisy chaining the Fireface to the Hard disk, the later being connected itself to the Macbook, and using this method the interface works. I also tried the interface on another computer and it works just fine - so the problem lies on my Macbook Pro.
    Now, I went to the Console application to see if there was any error messages, and in fact there are plenty. I got a bunch of 'FireWire (OHCI) Lucent ID 5901 built-in: Bad selfIDs, issuing bus reset (retry 2)' and then 'Missing self ID for node 0!'. Also got some 'Firewire (OHCI) Lucent ID 5901 built-in: 4403 resets in last 3 minutes'. Also 'SPFWR ERROR: Firewire bus may be unstable. Other Firewire devices may be present.'. Right now, If i plug the interface and look for something on the console, I get nothing. I only get something when I look on the System Profiler.
    So, obviously, there's a problem between my interface and the MBP. Anyone has ANY clue on what to do? BTW, the interface don't work when booting to bootcamp using W7 (it is also not recognized).But like I said, it works when daisy-chained to the hard disk or in another computer.
    Thanks a lot,
    Ivan

    Does the RME device have its own AC power supply brick? If so I would suspect that it is failing and the system is pulling too much juice from the MBP. When you have a drive daisy-chained the interface is able to get the juice it needs from that drive and not from the Mac itself.
    If it has no power supply brick you will have better luck with a powered hub.

  • FireWire Bus : Unable to list FireWire devices

    My FireWire drives (4 lacies) quit mounting. The system profiler says "Warning FireWire Bus : Unable to list FireWire devices". Is there something I should try before I go to Applecare with my brand new MacBook Pro with the glossy screen? I have check permissions and verified the disk and checked the cables, drives, etc they all work on other computers.

    I installed leopard on my mac mini's external FW boot drive with no problems and have used it for days. Then, yesterday my house experienced a momentary power drop (it was fast; not like a brownout) which resulted in my Firewire port becoming inaccessible! The system was unbootable.
    Thinking initially that it was a problem with the FW drive, I attached it to another Mac. Saw it no problems. So, the problem clearly lay on the Mac Mini.
    Ultimately, the solution was just solved by resetting the Mini's Power Manager Unit. Search Apple's technical articles for instructions for your particular Apple computer.
    Hope this helps

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