Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex Desk frustration

Update: so far, I've had a crash-free day. I've been able to log in and out, shutdown and restart and open and quit Disk Utility without having to hold down the power key. None of that was possible before I deleted all the Seagate drivers from my startup disk.

Since I bought the drive (last Tuesday) I've had no success with TIme Machine. It gets about 20GB into the initial backup and stops. I could tell Time Machine to stop backing up, but it refused to quit, and then everything else fell over.

I'll leave it for an overnight backup and report back if it's successful.

TAKE IT BACK!!! Don't bother wasting any more of your time.

Latest update:

The drive is working normally. Time machine ran flawlessly overnight, I now have a full backup of my startup disk. In addition, I've also copied a 20GB drive to another partition on the Seagate, and that completed without a hitch.

So, the solution appears to be: remove everything Seagate related from the startup disk. Invisible files, kexts, drivers, installers... everything. Spotlight won't show you all of these, so use something like EasyFind.

I reformatted & partitioned using Disk Utility, but that was no bother, I'd done that everytime the system ground to a halt mid-copy.

First thing I noticed was that the Seagate disk icons had been replaced by generic Mac USB drive icons. The capacity lights on the front of the drive no longer work, but that's no problem; the drive works normally now.

Nothing spent on new adaptors/bases; no replacing the USB cable; no installing extra 'no-sleep' patches; no sticking it in the freezer! It's just a drive with a USB interface, and it behaves how it should... once you remove the Seagate drivers.

FWIW, I think the problem probably does lie in the sleep setting. Something in the Seagate software tells the drive to sleep, regardless of your Mac's HD-sleep setting in Energy Saver preferences. That's what Windows users call a conflict; most Mac users will never see one of those!

I have the same drive and the solution for me was to place a small fan near the holes on the side to give it more airflow and cooling. It seems that the drive gets extremely hot in the case. I suspect that a temperature sensor inside the drive trips and that causes the drive to not respond or hang.

I've been running it this way for a couple weeks now and have had perfect backups ever since. I've been diligent to check the Console daily for any backup errors.

I even have the checkbox in the Energy Saver Prefences selected to "Put Hard Disks to Sleep When Possible" for the Battery, Power Adapter and UPS Tabs.

Hope this helps someone.

After battling a month with a 2TB GoFlex Firewire drive on my mid-2011 iMac, trying everything on these threads, I gave up, returned it to FutureShop and have a Western Digital 2 TB USB drive chugging along nicely now. Half the speed but reliable. Phew.

Shineysky:

Exactly what I finally did, in the exact same time frame you did, except that I got the 3TB WD drive. After that, everything was perfect. I was ready to take my entire computer back to the store and tell them to shove it! Amazing what frustration will do.

I did notice that Apple now has a system software upgrade to take you to 10.7.4. I wonder if it addresses any of the issues with the Seagate external. Probably not.

I'll take reliability and absence of problems over the slight increase in speed any day!!! Whateve speed was gained was lost with all the reboots with the Seagate!

I wish I'd read all of this before! now....what's be best method for getting all this data onto a NEW (non seagate) drive without it 'sleeping'?

All,

My drives started acting up again so I contacted Seagate support. I had tried deleting the driver which worked for a while, but not 100%. They had me reinstall their "updated" drivers that didn't work. Finally they admitted that these USB 3.0 drives are not fully compatible with Macs. They apologized for the issue and sent me 2 FW800 + USB 2.0 bases. Everything has been working perfectly since then.

Thus, if you're buying make sure to get the Mac only compatible version (with the FW800 + USB 2.0 base), or don't buy Seagate. If you already have one I'd suggest contacting their support and demand a Mac compatible base. Here is the exact quote from the Seagate support email:

"Thank you for contacting Seagate. I am sorry to hear that your you are having a problem with your GoFlex Desk hard drives. I see the drives you have are using USB 3.0 adapters. There has been a problem with USB adapters being 100% compatible with Mac computers because they have USB 2.0 ports. We can replace the adapters for you or you can return them back to the store you purchased them at to get a refund as Seagate can only replace the drives. The problem is most likely with the adapters. "

Good luck!

Hey, I just wanted to add a little bit from my experience with the Seagate Drive.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3985342

I wasn't able to delete all the files, but with the help of EasyFind and a little troubleshooting of the boot process I was able to find all the files

http://osxdaily.com/2007/01/22/what-happens-in-the-mac-os-x-boot-process/

If the files have been deleted and the system is still acting funky, check the /System/Library/Extensions and see if there are any seagate files there. They were off the scope of my searches. I used the OSXdaily article to figure out where to look on the boot process.

Thanks for having all of this info and to those who posted.

Seems removing the drivers is the key...

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3987947?tstart=30

The best possible solution for a rubbish product. Finally brainsnapped after a month of freezing, crashing, data loss, calls to tech support, combing the web for help, repartitioning, reformatting and swearing, exchanged it for a MyBook for Mac. Happy days.

I just replaced 639GB from Time Macine saved on a 3 TB SeagateGoFlex and further backed up with another 2 TB Seagatef GF. My late 2009 21.5 iMac HD failed and was replaced by Applecare with only two months left on my term. That is why I have had Applecare on every Apple product I have eownen in the last 6 years (7).

Some time ago I did have a Seagate fail and I could not have been treated more nicely or fairly. Nothing wrong with the other s such as Western Digital which I have also lwned and liked very much.

Simple fact: Hard Drives do fail. fortunately is infrequent but sufficiently often to provide incentive for complete and secjureback-ups.

I have over 8000 (300+ GB) photographs dating back to my ancestors in the 1800s, my childhood, my college and WWII and Korean plus all events since. For most of it, extra HDs have been made for the kids and grandkids, but ... I'm still here and activlely pursuing my hobby of photography.

Stayiong alert and aware will not only help you stay alive but save a lot of grief.

Ed

Hey Graham,

I'm a bit of a noob when it comes to the more technical stuff. Can you walk us through how to delte all the Seagate files on the startup disk?

I dowloaded easyfind and typed in seagate and then deleted anything that showed up. Is there anything more complicated I need to do to find the rest of the files?

Thanks 🙂

After deleting the files, restart and hold command-p,r while restarting to insure a fresh restart. Then restart again and use command-c,v to do a safe boot in verbose mode. Verbose mode lists what the machine is loading on a console type screen. If the name seagate appears on that screen, it is still somewhere on the system. If so you should follow my previous post's link and search the hidden startup directories for files. Easy find didn't show those files in the search.

Hi Binaryfaith,

It really is that simple, provided that you have administrator priviledges on your Mac (which you presumably have, if you installed the drive), easyfind should be able to find all of the Seagate files and delete them: drag 'em to the trash and then empty it.

Set easyfind to seek out invisible files & folders, and tick the 'case insenisitive' option as well.