External USB-A drives aren't firing up my new Mac Studio - fix?

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Level 4

2,467 points

External USB-A drives aren't firing up my new Mac Studio - fix?

I just got a new Mac Studio - but there’s a problem.

As you know, there are two USB-C ports on the front, and a bunch of ports on the the back. The two USB-C ports work fine. But when I plug my powered USB-A drives into the back, they don’t fire up.

I verified that a few smaller, non-powered USB-A backup drives fire up just fine. But when I try to fire up either of the powered drives (a Seagate and a G-Drive), they don’t seem to work.

I have two questions:

How can I make my old drives using the USB-A slot work on the Mac Studio?
If I get new drives, how do I transfer the content from the old USB-A drives to new USB-C drives - if my Mac Studio doesn’t recognize them?

Thanks!

Mac Studio (2023)

Posted on Jul 9, 2023 10:59 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

HWTech

Level 9

60,284 points

Jul 10, 2023 5:47 PM in response to poikkeus1

Not all adapters may be of equal quality or compatibility, so you may want to use a different brand of USB-C to USB-A Adapter.

Maybe try them with a powered USB3 hub in case those drives are not getting enough power to operate.

Not all external devices are compatible with an Apple Silicon Mac especially older devices which may use a chipset which is not compatible. I don't know if Apple ever fixed this issue with a later update, but I know there were a lot of posts about it back in 2020 when the first Apple Silicon Macs were released.

Do you have an older Mac? If you used these drives with a Windows computer, then maybe they are using a file system which is not compatible with macOS.....this can happen if the drives are formatted as exFAT on Windows since Windows (or the manufacturer) may utilize a file allocation size which is not compatible with macOS.

What file system is on these two drives?

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Answer 2

satcomer

Level 4

1,575 points

Jul 10, 2023 2:57 AM in response to poikkeus1

USB A does not carry power.never had and never will! However self powered devices that USB C in Mac and Firewire can!

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Answer 3

ku4hx

Level 7

23,586 points

Jul 10, 2023 5:53 AM in response to satcomer

Then how is it a USB-A external drive operates without a wall socket to power it? The answer is they get the power via the USB-A port.

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Answer 4

dialabrain

Level 10

124,685 points

Jul 10, 2023 4:02 AM in response to satcomer

satcomer wrote:

USB A does not carry power.never had and never will! However self powered devices that USB C in Mac and Firewire can!

FWIW, USB-A ports do in fact supply power. You can power portable SSDs, the SuperDrive, charge multiple devices from them, etc.

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Answer 5

poikkeus1 Author

Level 4

2,467 points

Jul 12, 2023 9:31 PM in response to poikkeus1

Thanks for your good responses.

Because of your responses, I have moved my equipment closer to USB-C compliance, excepting two larger hard drives.

I've also upgraded to a USB-C hub that should increase the reliability of my remaining devices. But I'm going to stay as close to 100% USB-C as possible. If one of my drives fails, it will be USB-C.

I checked all my cables, and they all work. But I replaced a potentially troublesome legacy power bar - which may have been responsible for the main issue with my Mac Studio. Right now, the machine is very fast and stable.

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