External LaCie hard drive sleep mode issue

I figured out a fix for my Lacie 12big and M1Max 16" macbook pro. If you open up terminal and enter "sudo pmset -c spindown 0" and then confirm by entering your admin password, it will prevent the drive from spinning down. It's been a few days since the fix and I'm having zero issues now inside premiere pro or lightroom. Hope this helps!

I'm having the exact same issue with my new m1 max macbook pro and Lacie 12big harddrive. My boss is also having the issue with the same laptop setup but the Lacie 6big drive. It seems to only be Lacie drives that are doing this and I cannot figure it out for the life of me. It's a huge issue because when in Lightroom or even premiere pro WHILE SCRUBBING FOOTAGE AND ACTIVELY USING THE DRIVE, it will go to sleep randomly and then you hear it spin back up. This seems to happen all the time and is terrible when it comes to time management and productivity. I also have it connected to a thunderbolt 4 hub but have tried direct connection to laptop with same issue. I do however has the Lacie harddrive raid software installed so it seems like with or without the software it's an issue. Wehave never had this with any of our other macs until we went to the new M1 max's.

Giorgio_ph, 

There are some additional isolation steps you can take such as testing in safe mode and a new user. That’s going to tell you whether the situation might be related to some third-party software or settings in your user. 

How to use safe mode on your Mac

Set up users, guests, and groups on Mac

If the issue persists through both of those, we’re going to recommend you connect with Apple Support on the matter. Contact Apple Support. 

Thank you. 

Hello Giorgio_ph, 

We understand that your external hard drive is seemingly waking and sleeping depending on the demands on the drive. 

Is your external hard drive connected to your Mac through a hub? If so, are you able to test connecting to directly your Mac? It looks like it, but to confirm, does your external hard drive have an external power supply? 

Thank you. 

Giorgio_ph, 

To clarify, does that mean the only time the drive goes to sleep is when your Mac is awake and in use? Having the external power supply does mean that the drive has power regardless of whether your Mac is turned on, and can be powered on even when your Mac is not. 

Does your external hard drive have any software that accompanies it that may need to be updated for the Apple silicon hardware? 

Thanks. 

Hi Giorgio! I'm having the same problem but didn't use the "Terminal option" yet. I wanted to ask you what do you mean when you say "I stop de Macbook"? Every time you shut it down you have to re enter that code? Thank you!