External HD + Mac Worries
 

Hey all,

Im setting up a new external HD on my new macbook. I formatted the external using FAT32 (MS-DOS as its known in mac) and everything is working fine when i copy files and extract files when booting in XP (I run bootcamp). However when I boot in tiger my external will show up no problems and the files are showing, but when I try to copy say a music file from external to the mac os desktop the whole transfer window will completely lock up, even force quiting will do nothing. Mp3 files will auto default to itunes but when I launch one off the exteral drive the same thing occurs, complete lockup.

Any suggestions what I did wrong? The external is a seagate 250gig USB 2.0 and my mac book is 2gig, 512 RAM.

Thanks very much

An output of DiskUtility / Info for the external drive might help here...

Launch the "Console" application (under /Applications/Utilities) and look for relevant error messages. Note that messages are labeled with the date & time so you can use that to locate the part of the log to look at. Copy & paste the relevant messages back here so we can see them.
Be sure to look at system.log as well as console.log (Use the "Logs" button (top-left) to see the various logs available - note that you will probably need to be an "admin" user to see the system.log)

Using USB instead of Firewire isn't a great idea. Combine that with a Microsoft format, and I'm surprised it works at all. If the drive has Firewire, try switching to that.

You know, only recently have PCs begun to include FireWire connectivity, and it is still FAR from common, so anyone sharing an external drive between a Mac and a PC almost -has- to be doing it over USB, so that isn't likely to be the ultimate source of the problem. But I have said, and I've seen more evidence, albeit not conclusive, that Macs version of FAT32 isn't wholly compatible with the Windows version. I recommend using a utility like Partition Magic on the PC to format the drive as FAT32 and then I expect you will have no problems.

Joe VanZandt

I don't believe FAT32 is exclusively a "Microsoft format" and it's supposed to be read/write supported in OSX unlike NTFS which is only read-supported (though with hacks there is write-support in some linux drivers).

He shouldn't have to switch to firewire, there are plenty of USB 2.0 ports on most Macs and they should function standardly/properly.

I had some problems getting my FAT32 / USB 2.0 HDD formatted, but it works fine now under Tiger.

Hey,

Ive already reformated the drive doing this and still no luck. Right after I did this I booted in mac, my external showed up fine, I copied one music file to the external, went perfectly, tried to copy the exact same file back to the mac local drive, system locked up, progress bar froze. Ownership of external = read and write. Ill try get some error logs soon

Thanks very much for the help

Oct 19 01:15:28 jonathan-hunters-computer diskarbitrationd[36]: disk1s1 msdos 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000 NO NAME /Volumes/NO NAME
Oct 19 01:16:48 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 524.808 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction past the completion deadline on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:17:19 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 555.809 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction past the completion deadline on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:17:25 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 561.809 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction which hasn't moved in 5 seconds on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:17:31 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 567.809 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction which hasn't moved in 5 seconds on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:17:37 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 573.810 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction which hasn't moved in 5 seconds on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:18:08 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 604.811 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction past the completion deadline on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:18:14 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 610.811 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction which hasn't moved in 5 seconds on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:18:20 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 616.812 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction which hasn't moved in 5 seconds on bus 253, timing out!
Oct 19 01:18:51 jonathan-hunters-computer kernel[0]: USBF: 647.813 AppleUSBEHCI[0x1c5c000]::Found a transaction past the completion deadline on bus 253, timing out!




Above are the logs from system, console shows nothing. This message will just continue

The "NO NAME" thing sounds strange.
The other message might indicate a problem with the USB controller on the drive.
Or maybe it's just a symptom of a bad USB cable?

I guess "NO NAME" could be a name, after all. But USBEHCI is Apple's USB 2.0 device driver. Since the poster reports that he has no problems with XP with this drive, if I read correctly, the chances of it being a bad cable are reduced, as is the liklihood that it is the drive contoller. It is possible that Apple's USB controller driver has somehow corrupted. Apple's USB 2.0 support has not been as good as XPs anyway. Is there a way to test this, other than to do an archive and install and see if the installation corrects the problem? Perhaps access to another USB drive to see if the problem persists?

Hayne could certainly be right about it being a bad cable or drive hardware; you might try using a new or known-good USB cable to see if it helps, but again the fact that it seems to work properly in XP makes me less confident that this is the issue, unless the Mac is just less tolerant of suspect cabling than XP is.

I just completed a archive and install, same thing happens im afraid. NO NAME simply refers to the name of the external drive, Partition magic named it that as i guess i forgot to specify one

As much I know of reading forums and my own sad experience DO NOT USE Partition Magic. It is not a true windows partitioner so the file system is kind of mess. The newer version the worst. Use fdisk if you can.

I've used Partition Magic for many years, not just to partition new drives, but to modify the partions on existing drives, and I've NEVER had a problem with it. I suppose I'd best check the net for any recent problems that might exist in newer versions. Thanks for the heads up.

I've had a 40 GB Maxtor drive formatted in Disk Utility as FAT show up over both USB and Firewire in both OS X and Windows in Boot Camp. No problems copying either way, in either OS, for the past 4 months.

I keep my Windows installers on that drive, and many of my Windows programs as well, so that I can have as small a Windows partition as possible on my Mac.

(MacBook 2.0, generic external Firewire/USB2 case, old Mac hard drive)

As far as alternative partitioning utilities go, I would stick with Disk Utility. It has successfully created useable FAT partitions on a number of drives and different types of media numerous times without incident.

You said it's only happening with MP3 and JPG files, that is certainly strange behaviour. Not sure what to make of that.

You say your drive has both USB and Firewire, do you use USB very often? I have what sounds like the same seagate 250gig USB 2.0 drive mentioned in the original post. It works ok on the MacBook sometimes, but will frequently lock up when copying large amounts of data (i.e. one very large file or lots of small ones). I use the same drive on a ThinkPad (which is why I got a USB drive formatted FAT32) and it works perfectly. It also works perfectly on an iBook.

I've noticed some very similar problems reported in other forums. The common factor seems to be that the USB driver in OSX for Intel has problems with any FAT32 disk that wasn't originaly formated by Disk Utility. It would be nice if Apple could fix that, but I will probably try copying my data and reformating the disk before that happens.

USBF: 2294.269 AppleUSBEHCI[0x2aa3000]::Found a transaction which hasn't moved in 5 seconds on bus 253, timing out!


If you are using an external hard drive enclosure and you receive this error message it is due to the cable that connects to the hard drive and the daughter board inside the enclosure. I ran across the same issues then replaced my cable and it works fine now.


Apr 14 15:57:15 mule kernel[0]: USBF: 6256.378 AppleUSBEHCI[0x2aa3000]::Found a transaction which hasn't moved in 5 seconds on bus 253, timing out!
Apr 14 16:34:30 mule diskarbitrationd[37]: disk1s3 hfs 01F68ABD-EA1A-30AD-9464-46CD04703F5F LaCie /Volumes/LaCie
Apr 14 16:37:19 mule diskarbitrationd[37]: disk2s1 ntfs 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000 New Volume /Volumes/New Volume
Apr 14 16:38:09 mule kernel[0]: hfs: Initializing the journal (joffset 0x5d4000 sz 0x1000000)...



Hope it helps

Jeff

1st Post :)

same problem
 

I am having the same problem. I have a 2.5" external drive in a NexStar enclosure. I get the following in usbprobe:
Found a transaction past the completion deadline on bus 253, timing out!

I tried 3 different usb cables in both ports of my macbook pro. All 3 of which work fine in windows XP. When i boot up XP in parallels, XP mounts the drive fine, then eventually OSX mounts it as another windows drive in addition to the C: Windows XP drive it mounts. That is the only way i can access it.

The drive is 40 gigs, formatted with Fat32. Any more ideas anyone? Thanks, its frustrating.

Did you use Disk Utility to format it? If not, you can try that, it may help.

I am having the exact same problem with the Star Tech 2.5" SATA to USB 2.0 enclosure. Have tried it both with and without external power. In both cases I get the same message.

I have tried this on 2 different Macs so far and they all give me that same error. In Windows the drive works perfectly.

Again, what program did you originally format the drive with?

The drive that got put in their was formatted on my Macbook (replaced with a larger HD) using HFS+.

If I boot into Windows, MacDrive saw the drive just fine, OS X no go. Tried to reformat in OS X, but the drive does not even show up in Disk Utility. I have since tried formatting with FAT32 and NTFS under Windows and again OS X does not see the drive, even in Disk Utility. I have even deleted all the partitions and left it literally a blank drive with no file system. No matter what I do I get that same error message in OS X while Windows (and now tested under Linux) both see the drive and can play with it just fine.

Hey, Recks im sorry to post so late... but i may have the solution to your problem, i too had a problem with my external HD locking up, i was processing some music in iTunes and it suddenly stop, my hard disk was still flashing but it didnt function..

i searched around and ive came up with this solution.

Macs, are best to be used with Hard Disk Formatted in this way

HFS+ Mac OS Extended (Journaling) <the journaling can be optional when you formatted this way.. no worries with the speed penalty if you dont want journaling it can be turned off...

My hard disk is the Western Digital 320GB USB My Passport Essential 2.5 inch HDD

Soo after formating the problem still existed...
checked console for the problem and it seem like the process of trying to write files into the Hard Disk may have timed out...

I decided to go to Disk Utility in the Utilities folder, and i did a simple quick Verify and a Repair of the Disk, when doing this, both processes will show you that the Hard Disk was fine.... but after the fix... you'll realise you can write things without mess again...

well atleast alittle larger files, i copied stuff 1 by 1 for 1 GB didnt try to move the whole library to the HD, cuz i didnt want it to happen but before the repair, i cant even move 1GB, it freezes around 40mb, so im real please with the fix... not sure if its surely the case, but ill give it a try!

good luck!