MBPR usb drives "unmounting" problem

New MBPR 16GB 256GB 10.7.4
Periodially mounted volumes dissapear with the "you didn't eject the drive first" warning.
Has happened repeatably in front of me and have seen it upon returning to my computer after being left alone.
Could be a bug in sleep functions?
Anyone else?

I have a solution that I just verified.
My USB3 array kept unmounting while in Final Cut Pro X, and it was maddening. It did not suffer the unmounting bug while copying between drives…only when it was doing background tasks like transcoding it would run for about 15 min. then simply unmount and report "Disk improperly disconnected…" dialog. Of course it broke my mirror, corrupted files etc. as you might expect. I had to power cycle the array to get it to work again. My JBOD PM array has 5 drives…a 2 disk 2TB SoftRAID stripe, a single 1TB and a pair of 4TB mirrored in SoftRAID. Now I had configured this SansDigital esata/USB3 5 disk array before I got the new MBP that had USB3 on it, using an esata bus on an older machine and it was flawless for 2 months of work. All disks SoftRAID certified, no issues. I also got flawless (if much slower, as expected) operation connecting it to a USB 2 port on an old MBP.
I had a eureka moment today, and I think it may help a lot of others suffering similar issues.
I went on the internet and saw a bunch of folks on the Apple support forums having similar issues with USB3 unmounting drives. Then it hit me….15 minutes was the time set in Energy Saver to sleep the computer or try to spin down drives (the "Put hard disks to sleep when possible" option is checked by default). From my Google search I read on a PC site that USB3 as a protocol hates to be slept in its current version, so...using the Mac equivalent of that PC sites Windows suggestion, I unchecked the "Put hard disks to sleep when possible" option in Energy Saver, and set the MBP to never sleep with Power Adapter connected, and I am pleased to report I have been working in FCP without incident for the last 5 hours. Everything is cranking away much faster than before and without a problem.
I did not test sleeping the computer and having the drives eject (another issue reported as lot), but at least this looks like it is operating reliably. My assumption would be sleeping would kill the USB3 connection, so eject the drives when sleeping to be safe.
Hope this helps,
KJ Doyle

Similar Messages

Stop USB Drive unmounting at User Logoff

When my users logoff, the external USB drive is unmounted. The external drive is used to hold the users home directory. I have placed an entry in fstab as:
+*/dev/disk1s6 /Mount/LaCie hfs noowners 0 2*+
The mount works with +*mount -a*+
I got the system to stop from unmounting the drive at login with the command
+*defaults write /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/autodiskmount AutomountDisksWithoutUserLogin -bool YES*+
which I found in another post.
At this point I have to issue a mount after as user logs off, which is pretty rare at my house, fortunately.
How can I change my systems behavior to leave the /Mount/LaCie drive mounted when the users log on or off?

Teresa Meerschaert wrote:
+*defaults write /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/autodiskmount AutomountDisksWithoutUserLogin -bool YES*+
That command should keep disks mounted no matter who logs in or out. Isn't it working for you? Did you reboot after entering the command?

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Hi
I posted this as a reply to a similar thread also.
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Hi
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Regarding USB Driver (OMAP1710) Problem for Belkin...

Dear All,
I've been trying to update my Belkin Skype Phone (F1PP000GN-SK) from version: 1.1.0.10 R20 to version: 1.1.0.22R20 from the belkin support site.
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I believe the original drivers packaged with the Belkin installer/flasher may work on the 32-bit version of Windows 7, but will not work with the 64-bit version. Since I do own this phone, I decided to resolve this problem for myself as well. Even though they are not available from Belkin, I was able to track down and extract/modify the latest drivers/inf for this phone.
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You can use thumb drive.. it has to be formatted correctly.. fat32 or HFS+ of course.
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Hi all,
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So, I have two questions:
1: Is there a workaround for this NTFS/FAT issue so that I can get Snow Leopard onto my computer with only the usb drive, my computer and my friend's pc? SL is currently on the usb drive in NTFS format.
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Thanks in advance!

NTFS is a Widows only file system. Mac OS X can read it, but not write to it, and certainly not boot from it.
FAT32 is read/write on both platforms, but as far as I'm aware you can't boot from it.
To boot an OS X system you need to format on a Mac as GUID partition Map and Mac OS Extended (Journalled) file system (aka HFS+ (J) ).
As to whether the optical drive is repairable, without hands-on no-one can say for sure. I assume you've done the basics of cleaning the laser heads and such.

FIXED my USB drive connectivity problems!

I wasn't able to get my USB drive working off of my AEBSn; doing so would cause the router to reboot.
I solved this by formatting my drive to FAT32 (in my case), which has a block size of 512 bytes. I used a program called fat32format on windows. I wasn't able to format it the way I needed it in OSX.
YAY!

It works but is flaky...
I have to turn the router off and back on again if I want to turn the drive back on.
HAS ANYONE ELSE EXPERIENCED THIS?

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Darrin

Actually, you can format and have multiple partitions and drag volume names into the RAID tab.
I've seen a couple people with problems with WD MyBook 500GB models, and they were using FW interface on Mac Pro, so I would guess it is the bridge that WD uses.
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You should be able to mirror an internal drive and ext. FireWire.
Any errors on one drive get copied to 2nd. Useful for someone that doesn't know to backup but otherwise... also, SoftRAID 3.6 ($149) would probably do a better job but overkill. It also alerts you immediately if there is an I/O error of any kind.

How can I fix Intel 5 series/3400 USB driver installation problem?

I am using Boot Camp to install Windows 7 64 bit on an iMac (mid 2010). After Windows and Apple Windows drivers are installed, I get an error message about the Intel 5 series/3400 Series Chipset Family USB Universal Host controller 3B3B failing to install. Reinstalling the driver does not work. I get the yellow triangle with the exclamation mark on the computer icon in the list of devices, indicating there is a problem.
I searched for this problem on the Apple website. I found info about this exact issue with the MacBook Pro, (mid 2010), Windows 7 64 bit and Boot Camp. The article said to ignore it, that this wouldn't be a problem. Would this also not be a problem for my iMac?
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thanks, Kevin

Have you done:
Removing and Reinstalling iTunes, QuickTime, and other software components for Windows XP
or
Removing and reinstalling iTunes, QuickTime, and other software components for Windows Vista or Windows 7
What results do you get when you run this:
iTunes for Windows: Device Sync Tests
Do both the Home button and Power button work OK normally?

Western Digitial external USB drive recognition problem

Hi
I recently bought a Western Digital USB 250gb external drive. I connected it to my G4 Powerbook running OSX10.2.8 and it had no problem recognising it. I then dumped across a load of data successfully.
A few days later I upgraded to Tiger and now the G4 won't recognise the external drive at all. I have scoured the forums for an answer but have found nothing to fix a drive problem where the drive just doesn't appear at all in disk utility (or on the desktop)!
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Many thanks,
Mark

Welcome to Apple Discussions!
Do you have any other USB devices connected to your Powerbook?
Is this a recognition problem right after the computer boots up? Or had the computer fallen to sleep prior to your connecting it? Sometimes I've seen USB ports fall into a low power mode causing problems recognizing USB devices until the machine is next rebooted.
If you have critical data on that drive, you may want to try Prosoft Data Rescue to see if it can see what is on that drive. You can also buy an external Firewire enclosure and try to move the drive to that, or find someone with a PowerMac G4 or G3 tower to see if it can be taken out of the case and put in the tower for recognition. If you do the latter, be sure that the jumper is set for the master/slave setting that matches the cable you are connecting in the drive.

Obscure Nano and Mini XP USB Driver Problem Finally Solved

I had a rather obscure USB driver registry problem that few others would probably have, but this might be helpful.
I was unable to get Windows XP SP2 Media Center Edition to properly recognize either my iPod Mini or Nano 3rd generation. The iPods would be seen by XP in Device Manager (would show Apple iPod USB Driver) when connected, but would immediately disconnect. The Apple iPod USB Driver properties would then show “This device cannot start (Code 10).”
I first tried all the Apple-recommended fixes: the five Rs; reinstalling the Apple iPod USB driver; disconnecting all other USB devices; switching USB plug-in points; putting the iPod into Drive Mode; and all the other things shown in the troubleshooting guide “iPod shows up in Windows but not in iTunes,” http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93716
None of the above worked. And on occasion after uninstalling and reinstalling the iPod USB driver, I would get a blue screen with the error message “driverirql_not_less_orequal,” sometimes followed by stop codes and something called “USBPORT.SYS.”
Apple phone support was unable to help, claiming that XP Media Center Edition was not supported, though the problem appeared to have no relation to MCE versus Home or Pro.
Then I finally stumbled onto the solution. I previously had installed a USB drive encryption program (NTINinja) on my computer. Although I had uninstalled the program months earlier, it had left a registry entry which was interfering with the iPods. When I deleted the registry entry, the problem was solved.
Those of you having similar recognition problems as described above might check Control Panel, System, Hardware, Device Manager, Universal Serial Bus Controllers, USB Root Hub, Properties, Details, then select Class Lower Filters in the drop-down box. If there is an entry, that might be the problem.
To get rid of the entry, first write down what it is. Then go to Start, Run, Regedit. Backup the registry (File, Export). Then go to Edit, Find, and type in the suspect entry. It should find the registry key containing the entry in HKEYLOCALMACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\.
Right click on the LowerFilters key and select Modify. Then delete the suspect entry. Close the registry editor. You might have to reboot – can’t remember.
I can’t guarantee the above is completely accurate, but it may help someone.

OK now! Dag, I was going crazy. I had two brand new Raptors and was trying to hook them up in a RAID 0 config. I am no dummy. It would hang at detecting arrays. I could not figure it out for the life of me. I will not talk about all of the combos that I tried. My buddy told me to try datalifeguard from WD. I did. Well, one HD showed no serial number in the extended test. An error message popped up. Said the drive was not working. So, Newegg sends me a dead drive and wastes days and days out of my life. I hooked up the one good drive just now. What do I see? For the first time in my life, I am seeing the raid bios! This almost cost me a divorce. Seriously though, the wife would come in and rub my shoulders like a fighter after a few hours of getting my azz whipped by this new rig. I am now going to make the floppy with the newer drivers like was done here. Just incase. I am in Raid bios now in the other room. Time to go set up XP on one drive for now. I refuse to wait for the RMA'ed second Raptor.

Hard Drive Unmounting Itself

Hi,
I have a WD MyBook USB external hard drive that used to work fine. Now, it will not mount unless I unplug its power for at least 15 minutes, plug the power back in, and then plug it into my MacBook Pro. Once it mounts, it will then unmount itself after about an hour. The power light on the hard drive never turns off, though. I've searched the discussion and can't find any similar problems. Any help with this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I am having the same issue.... the USB drive unmounts at unexpected moments.
For me, it happens always with iTunes open, or when trying to transfer files to or from the external drive.
Mine is a new issue since the latest iTunes update. Apple refuses to give phone support and does not answer email event reports.

WD My cloud USB drive mount command???

Hello,
I've a backup script which is autoscheduled and backs up my data to the usb drive. I would like to keep usb drive unmounted until the script starts since twonky scans my usb drive as well and I couldn't disable it from both twonky setup and my cloud UI. After reboot it starts scanning again. (if you know this, it will be a better solution)
So after reboot I would like to unmount the usb disk. I found the unmount command in the forum. Thansk to Nazar.
However I don't know how to mount the drive from the script.
Can you please help me on this?
Thanks...

mount [ -o options,.. ] /dev/sdb1 /path/to/existing/directory or if you know your stuffs let it auto mount on boot, edit /etc/fstab as below, then mount -a or mount /dev/sdb1: /dev/sdb1 /path/to/existing/directory filesystem(i.e. vfat) options(i.e. defaults) backup-dump(i.e. 0) pass-fsck(i.e. 0) Note all above is not supported by WD and warrants warranty void. Wrong fstab entries may not boot up your nas properly so I don't recommend this unless you fully understood. I did a mistake once while mounting additional swap space which end up opening the drive just to recover. Read more https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fstab

Problem with USB drive not writing/freezing on unmount.

I have a sandisk cruzer blade USB drive, which I have used for the past hours extensively. At one point, I couldn't manage to write data to it. It acted like it had, but it didn't, as it silently remounted as readonly. I solved this by remounting as rw and retried.
Now, when using the same drive, after writing around 2 GiB worth of data to it (creating files), and attempting to unmount, the unmount command freezes for a long period of time. I check dmesg and it says its frozen. So I open up another tab to try and rescue the writes I made by typing sync. This also freezes and generates dmesg messages.
As I'm typing this the commands seemed to have succeeded, but I'm wondering, what causes these problems? Is the problem known?
dmesg output:
[ 1440.339510] INFO: task umount:1540 blocked for more than 120 seconds.
[ 1440.339518] "echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this message.
[ 1440.339523] umount D ffff88021da81950 0 1540 1539 0x00000004
[ 1440.339531] ffff8801d9ad7c70 0000000000000082 0000000000014500 ffff8801d9ad7fd8
[ 1440.339538] ffff8801d9ad7fd8 0000000000014500 ffff88021da81950 ffff88022ec94500
[ 1440.339545] ffff8801d9ad7bc0 ffffffff81091995 ffff88022211c380 0000000000000002
[ 1440.339551] Call Trace:
[ 1440.339565] [<ffffffff81091995>] ? check_preempt_curr+0x85/0xa0
[ 1440.339571] [<ffffffff8108ecfa>] ? ttwu_stat+0x9a/0x110
[ 1440.339579] [<ffffffff81093a0c>] ? try_to_wake_up+0x1fc/0x2c0
[ 1440.339586] [<ffffffff814e1029>] schedule+0x29/0x70
[ 1440.339593] [<ffffffff814dd909>] schedule_timeout+0x219/0x290
[ 1440.339599] [<ffffffff8107b746>] ? __queue_work+0x136/0x390
[ 1440.339606] [<ffffffff814e03c3>] wait_for_common+0xd3/0x180
[ 1440.339612] [<ffffffff81093b10>] ? wake_up_process+0x40/0x40
[ 1440.339617] [<ffffffff814e048d>] wait_for_completion+0x1d/0x20
[ 1440.339625] [<ffffffff811c8bd0>] writeback_inodes_sb_nr+0x80/0xb0
[ 1440.339648] [<ffffffff811c8c25>] writeback_inodes_sb+0x25/0x30
[ 1440.339655] [<ffffffff811cdedd>] sync_filesystem+0x2d/0xa0
[ 1440.339662] [<ffffffff811a1cb0>] generic_shutdown_super+0x30/0xe0
[ 1440.339668] [<ffffffff811a1f97>] kill_block_super+0x27/0x70
[ 1440.339678] [<ffffffff811a22fd>] deactivate_locked_super+0x3d/0x60
[ 1440.339684] [<ffffffff811a28e6>] deactivate_super+0x46/0x60
[ 1440.339689] [<ffffffff811bdeaf>] mntput_no_expire+0xef/0x150
[ 1440.339695] [<ffffffff811bf0b1>] SyS_umount+0x91/0x3b0
[ 1440.339701] [<ffffffff814ea5dd>] system_call_fastpath+0x1a/0x1f
[ 1560.250364] INFO: task umount:1540 blocked for more than 120 seconds.
[ 1560.250371] "echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this message.
[ 1560.250375] umount D ffff88021da81950 0 1540 1539 0x00000004
[ 1560.250383] ffff8801d9ad7c70 0000000000000082 0000000000014500 ffff8801d9ad7fd8
[ 1560.250390] ffff8801d9ad7fd8 0000000000014500 ffff88021da81950 ffff88022ec94500
[ 1560.250397] ffff8801d9ad7bc0 ffffffff81091995 ffff88022211c380 0000000000000002
[ 1560.250403] Call Trace:
[ 1560.250416] [<ffffffff81091995>] ? check_preempt_curr+0x85/0xa0
[ 1560.250422] [<ffffffff8108ecfa>] ? ttwu_stat+0x9a/0x110
[ 1560.250429] [<ffffffff81093a0c>] ? try_to_wake_up+0x1fc/0x2c0
[ 1560.250435] [<ffffffff814e1029>] schedule+0x29/0x70
[ 1560.250442] [<ffffffff814dd909>] schedule_timeout+0x219/0x290
[ 1560.250448] [<ffffffff8107b746>] ? __queue_work+0x136/0x390
[ 1560.250454] [<ffffffff814e03c3>] wait_for_common+0xd3/0x180
[ 1560.250460] [<ffffffff81093b10>] ? wake_up_process+0x40/0x40
[ 1560.250465] [<ffffffff814e048d>] wait_for_completion+0x1d/0x20
[ 1560.250473] [<ffffffff811c8bd0>] writeback_inodes_sb_nr+0x80/0xb0
[ 1560.250493] [<ffffffff811c8c25>] writeback_inodes_sb+0x25/0x30
[ 1560.250499] [<ffffffff811cdedd>] sync_filesystem+0x2d/0xa0
[ 1560.250506] [<ffffffff811a1cb0>] generic_shutdown_super+0x30/0xe0
[ 1560.250513] [<ffffffff811a1f97>] kill_block_super+0x27/0x70
[ 1560.250522] [<ffffffff811a22fd>] deactivate_locked_super+0x3d/0x60
[ 1560.250528] [<ffffffff811a28e6>] deactivate_super+0x46/0x60
[ 1560.250533] [<ffffffff811bdeaf>] mntput_no_expire+0xef/0x150
[ 1560.250538] [<ffffffff811bf0b1>] SyS_umount+0x91/0x3b0
[ 1560.250545] [<ffffffff814ea5dd>] system_call_fastpath+0x1a/0x1f
[ 1560.250550] INFO: task sync:1547 blocked for more than 120 seconds.
[ 1560.250553] "echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this message.
[ 1560.250556] sync D ffffffff811cdd00 0 1547 985 0x00000000
[ 1560.250561] ffff8801be2e1e68 0000000000000086 0000000000014500 ffff8801be2e1fd8
[ 1560.250567] ffff8801be2e1fd8 0000000000014500 ffff8801c1335460 ffff8801be2e1e70
[ 1560.250573] ffffffff811326ab ffff8801be2e1de0 ffff88020bdbc280 0000000000000080
[ 1560.250579] Call Trace:
[ 1560.250586] [<ffffffff811326ab>] ? filemap_fdatawait_range+0x17b/0x1a0
[ 1560.250594] [<ffffffff811cdd00>] ? generic_write_sync+0x60/0x60
[ 1560.250599] [<ffffffff814e1029>] schedule+0x29/0x70
[ 1560.250604] [<ffffffff814e1d85>] rwsem_down_read_failed+0xc5/0x120
[ 1560.250610] [<ffffffff81292744>] call_rwsem_down_read_failed+0x14/0x30
[ 1560.250616] [<ffffffff814dffa7>] ? down_read+0x17/0x20
[ 1560.250620] [<ffffffff811a34cc>] iterate_supers+0x9c/0x110
[ 1560.250628] [<ffffffff811cdf85>] sys_sync+0x35/0x90
[ 1560.250633] [<ffffffff814ea5dd>] system_call_fastpath+0x1a/0x1f

mr.MikyMaus wrote:You do know that flash memories have limited number of write cycles, right?
Limited how? Like all storage devices have (in other words, after a while they break)?
The drive is completely new, like 3 weeks or something.

User Tip: MBPr + USB issue and how to recover hard drives.

I did want to share this in case someone runs into this problem:
Since I bought this MPBr in June it has "destroyed" my external USB drives on at least 7 ocassions. By "destroyed" I mean this: Either during a "Wake up failure" or ususally after reboot the drives suddenly were not "recognized" and I would get that dreaded "Initialize, Eject or Ignore" screen we all fear. When it happened and I tried all the standard repair tools (TechTool Pro, Disk Warrior, Data Rescue, etc) most often I ended up wiping the drives since they didn't hold much data, the important stuff safely away inside firewire drives not connected to the MPRr.
That was until last week.
A fact checklist:
All the drives were from different makers and different ages (some brand new, some 1-2 years old). Made no difference.
The drives were both powered and unpowered. Made no difference.
The "destruction" would happen either when the computer went to sleep or simply when trying to use a USB hub.
I tried 5 different USB hub models. All of them did the same thing.
To avoid issues, I was reduced to NOT using USB hubs (or even trying) and unplugging EVERYTHING at the end of the day.
An assistant who was not aware of these problems made the horrible mistake of getting a USB hub and pluging these drives which now held VERY IMPORTANT information, some backed up, some which it had not been backed up yet. Almost INSTANTLY all the drives went bad: Unrecognized. Now, I really couldn't get mad at her because - let's be honest- using a USB hub is not "up there" in the scale of "dangeorus activities" in the computing the world, but it left me 3 dead large size USB drives..And they all had the same problem:
When plugged in, the system would simply not recognize them.
Pluging them into an older mac or another mac had the same response.
In a few occassions the drives would actually appear briefly and disappear again. We are talking seconds here.
NONE of the repair tools could fix them: TechTool Pro, Disk Warrior and fdsk were helpless.
Data Rescue could actually see the partitions greyed out but could not access them
After some digging around it seems whatever is happening with MBPr's USB/Mac OSX/Firmaware is destroying the PARTITION TABLES of USB drives. The data is still there, the system simply cannot access it.
Eventually I came up with the solution which involves recovering the partition tables via Terminal using an open source program TestDisk. The name of "Stellar Phoenix Recovery" software also popped into from time to time (which I do remember from the old days), but I could not find an actual example of a succesful recovery.
What you will need:
This program runs in the Terminal with a very basic interface that uses arrow keys, enter and a few letters. That said, if you have never used Terminal or are not familiar with the terminology I suggest you find someone who does.
Get the software here: TestDisk - http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk If everything goes well, this will be the one time you will truly be motivated to donate some cash. The euphory alone will do it. I know it for me, that's for sure.
For my recovery I followed this step-by-step tutorial by Perro Hunter, but BE AWARE that it was written at an earlier date as apparently some of the features that the tutorial mentions as "not working yet" are now.
http://perrohunter.com/repair-a-mac-os-x-hfs-partition-table/
In my case I did not need to go past step 7, which is good because the warning it gives is pretty bone-chilling. In my case the software was able to write the recovered partition tables by itself and then when I restarted....the drives were there. DO NOT IGNORE THE BACK UP AND LOG INSTRUCTIONS. EVER.
Keep in mind that my drives were formatted as Mac OS X HFS+ / GUID partitions. I have no idea how it will work with other types of formatting. The process itself is very fast. if IN DOUBT, just quit terminal and start over (I did twice until I finally figure out what I was doing). Also, take screen shots as you move along the steps it helps.
Needless to say, after recovery use Disk Utility, Disk Warrior or TechTool Pro to get the drives back in shape, and if possible, back up everything and wipe them clean which is what I did just to be sure.
I hope that helps somebody and good luck to you in the process.

Someone tried to follow this information and perro hunter's blog was not loading.
3rdLOF made a version on pastedbin here:
http://pastebin.com/Jb9NfxZf
In case anyone needs it
I tried posting this as a User Tip, won't let me.

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