Copying to external USB 2.0 drive hangs

Question

Copying to external USB 2.0 drive hangs

I have had problems copying files to my external USB 2.0 hard drive. My initial testing shows that if my file copy is very large (2GB or more), OS X will simply stop copying, though the progress bar suggests it is still going. The progress bar just sits there idling, with the promise of copying more but it never does. I have to restart the computer to get it to forget about the file copy. Hitting the cancel (grey "X") button in the copy dialog box does nothing. System Profiler says it sees the drive. The external drive shows no activity during this.
The Finder hangs and I have to restart the system to get a usable computer again.

I'll need to do more thorough testing with the other USB ports and alternate cables, but I was wondering if anyone has experienced anything similar.

17" dual-2.16 MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.4.7), 1GB RAM, dual boot XP Home, non-glossy, Xcode 2.3

Posted on Jul 31, 2006 3:26 PM

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Answer 1

iVmichael

Level 6

13,740 points

Jul 31, 2006 7:04 PM in response to Christopher Drum

I copy way more than 2GB (closer to 50) every day to a USB 2.0 Seagate 2.5" 160GB drive with no problems. No single file would be that size however if that's what you mean?

You're just dragging the file/folders across to the drive on the Desktop not using some utility software?

Is there anything funky with the files you're copying i.e. are some Windows and some Mac or some big image file?

Have you set the drive (in Energy Saver) to sleep when it can?

Some people have found the left and right USB ports behave differently power-wise, try swapping over.

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Answer 2

Jul 31, 2006 8:26 PM in response to iVmichael

Nothing funky with the files, no. If a single folder I drag to the drive contains many GB of data, that is typically when I see the problem. It is sort of acting like it lost the connection to the drive in mid-copy, but nothing onscreen indicates such a problem. I first really noticed the problem when copying Linux ISO files, which were over 2GB each.

The difference between left and right ports is an interesting experiment to try. I'll definitely give that a shot and see how my performance is.

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Answer 3

kybdf2

Level 1

0 points

Aug 28, 2006 4:45 AM in response to Christopher Drum

Please have a look at my post in this topic:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=515607&tstart=0

I am experiencing similar problems with my MBP...

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Answer 4

Aug 28, 2006 5:02 AM in response to Christopher Drum

Whilst I have no problem copying large files to/from my 40GB iPod , I remember reading that my LaCie 400GB USB2/NAS (which I use as USB2) cannot cope with an individual file transfer of about 4GB. I think this was due to the fact that my LaCie ED Mini actually has a Linux OS. In fact, on first release of the MBPro I couldn't get ANY connectivity until LaCie updated the Mac OSX Intel drivers and the external HDD firmware.

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