usb harddisk not working

[Polytropon]

On Sat, 21 Nov 2020 21:26:13 +0100, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> On Sat, 21 Nov 2020 20:44:25 +0100, Polytropon wrote:
> >This could be a wiring thing, but in my experience with cheap USB disk
> >enclosings, it's probably a version of the firmware (the part that
> >does "USB plug <---> SATA disk") that is not working properly and
> >according to the standard. This can also explain the "works here, but
> >not there" and "works sometimes, but not always".
> 
> Hahaha,
> 
> IIRC we already agreed off-list regarding USB enclosures and the
> firmware a while ago.
> 
> I can not remember that we discussed wiring issues.
> 
> IMO it's super-very-most-unlikely a wiring issue. I can't imagine a
> reasonable wiring issue.

I wanteed to mention this because I experienced that once:
It was a USB enclosure with the came it came with - worked
sometimes, on some systems, but was hard to predict _where_
it would work _when_. Turned out, after removing the
original USB cable and using a different one, the disk
worked everywhere every time. :-)

I called this "wiring issue" because the only thing involved
is the wires in the USB cable. There _might_ be wiring
problems within the enclosure (PCB to disk), but that doesn't
seem to happen that often. Still a possibility.



> In the beginning I disassembled the drives and connected them to my PC
> to test, if the drives are broken. Nowadays I don't even test the
> drives, I directly return such USB enclosures. I even don't waste time
> to test another USB port ;), let alone another computer.

In the past, I also solved "broken disk" issues by removing
them from the enclosure and attaching them to my trusted
JMicron universal adapter (for SATA, PATA, mini-PATA), using
the original power supply. So far, that worked on _every_
computer's _every_ USB port. :-)



-- 
Polytropon
Magdeburg, Germany
Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0
Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...