LaCie d2 Quadra v3 new firmware update

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LaCie d2 Quadra v3 new firmware update

Many threads have complained that the new LaCide d2 Quadra v3 drives, introduced earlier this year, do not work reliably, if at all, under Mac OS X 10.7 Lion. Most users have blamed the "ECO mode" capability built into these drives.

I just learned that on October 16, 2011 LaCie released a new firmware update that, according to their website, is designed to "Disable ECO mode by default." This sounds promising, and I just installed it. We'll see whether it works....

Download it at <http://www.lacie.com/support/drivers/driver.htm?id=10248>.

Quad Core Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.2)

Posted on Oct 30, 2011 12:04 PM

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Answer 1

cheeseb Author

Level 1

28 points

Nov 1, 2011 2:33 AM in response to cheeseb

I'm afraid the drive failed again overnight despite applying the new October 16 firmware update that turns off ECO mode by default. The same old problems: it spins down, the light goes out, and from then on nothing gets it to spin up except unplugging the power to the drive.

I have this drive connected to the Firewire 800 port on the front of my Mac Pro, with 6 other LaCie drives connected to the two Firewire 800 ports on the back of my Mac Pro. The only further test I can think of is to disconnect all of the other external drives and try the new v3 drive by itself on one of the back ports.

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Answer 2

Nov 1, 2011 4:44 PM in response to cheeseb

The firmware update does seem to have solved a problem I was having with Time Machine and my new LaCie d2 quadra drive, connected via FireWire 800. After the computer went to sleep for over an hour, when I woke it up, the LaCie would start spinning incessantly, and was stuck in "preparing backup" forever. The drive could not be ejected, and trying to stop the backup caused the Finder to crash. The only way to correct the problem was to shut off the LaCie and then turn it back on again. After installing the firmware update today, the problem seems to have gone away. The LaCie tech support guy said the drive has its own sleep mode, which was not compatible with the sleep mode of my iMac. The update turns off the sleep mode of the drive.

Installing the update was a non-obvious procedure. It goes in via Terminal to do it. You can get the instructions from the LaCie tech support people. Just downloading the update doesn't do the trick.

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Answer 3

Apr 18, 2012 6:15 AM in response to cheeseb

You need to make sure the drive you are updating is the only one connected to the computer. Run the firmware updater and it automatically turns off "Eco Mode". Now my drive works as expected. It wouldn't be so bad if the drive came out of sleep when you woke the computer up. This problem drove me crazy until they came out with the update. The whole system ran slowly until I unplugged the drive, bootup took forever and programs would freeze all the time. Mine was the D2 Quadra V3 and the link below did the trick without the need to call Lacie. The link provided above did not lead to the V3 updater, this one does.

Click on the updater and enter your password when prompted.

http://www.lacie.com/support/drivers/driver.htm?id=10248

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