Yosemite ejects external drives

Beyond frustrating.

New iMac
WD 3TB external used for Time Machine ( USB port) ejects when it goes to sleep
G-Tech 2TB used for photos (USB Port) ejects when it goes to sleep
The only drive yet to suffer (yet) this problem is a G-Tech 1TB portable which gets used with both my IMac ( Thunderbolt) and Macbook pro.

Have tried disabling the WD (not connected) and then connect the G-Tech external, via a USB hub as well. No Joy

Have to believe its Apple thats going to "sleep" at the wheel

I have been following this post since 10.11 was released, that's when I started having this problem on a my late 2012 iMac. I didn't have the problem with Yosemite, only El Capitan. I have several external drives which have been randomly ejecting... Now I am becoming hopeful! My problem, knock on wood, seems to have been resolved by the 10.11.4 update. Yes, it has been less than a week, but so far I have not had a single occurrence, where previously it was almost every day!

Well, after adjusting the go to sleep settings in Energy saver.
Not longer happening to any of my externals.

IS occurring now with my card reader (plugged into a USB hub).

Think it's safe to say it's not hardware related, and is definitely software/OS related.

Cmon Apple, get it together and address the problems.

Dear All,

Having the same random ejection problem with a WD My Book Studio for Mac. It randomly ejects itself, and has now begun to eject itself immediately after startup, so no sleep problem there. I did go in yesterday and uncheck the sleep box in System Prefs, but that did not help me -- the drive ejected itself right after startup this morning.

I have two WD My Book Studio for Mac drives attached, and one ejects itself, the other does not -- the older one running firewire or USB 2 does not eject, the newer one with an SS (super speed) tag on the USB 3 cord is the one causing the problem.

WD thinks it's a power issue and is sending me a new power cord under warranty. They also said it could be an issue with the USB cord, and I have a new one on order. I wonder if using a regular speed USB 3 rather than an SS cord would solve the problem -- I assume there are USB3 cords that are NOT super speed. I hope we get the issue resolved.

Im running an iMac with El Capitan 10.11.4

Dear All,

I received the new power supply from Western Digital today for my Macbook Studio that keeps ejecting itself. I opened Adobe Bridge to work on some photos and was going from file to file when it ejected itself from the desktop -- so much for the power cord being the issue. I'll now wait until the new USB3 SS cord comes in to see if that's the issue, but somehow I don't think that will work either. I keep you posted.

Hi!

I have a 2012 Mac mini, which has attached via Thunderbolt a Lacie 2big Thunderbolt2 and an LG 34UM95-P display.

I also have the problem that the Lacie drive is ejected after sleep of the Mac mini sometimes (the Mac mini has to sleep for an hour).

I wrote a bugreport to apple, but they told me that they can not reproduce it and they closed the bugreport. I can reproduce it with a fresh install of El Capitan all the time. :-(

I wrote to Lacie and they gave me a complete new drive, but nothing changed. Afterwards someone from Lacie called me to here if the new drive is working and he told me that it seems that Apple is not waiting for the drive to spin up at waking up from sleep.

The drive is working fine connected via USB 3 to the Mac mini, but that is not the reason why I bought a Thunderbolt drive. :-(

But Apple is doing nothing on this problem! It's a shame! I am very, very p.... off. Did I told that I am p... off?

Dear All,

Replaced both my power supply and my USB SS 3 cable as Western Digital suggested, and it did not help -- still random ejections with no rhyme nor reason. It seems that the more I put on the drive, the more the problem occurs, as if it can't keep up -- this happens frequently when using Adobe Bridge, but after I unplug the drive from the power source and try it again, it will be stable and I can transfer large amounts of data with no problem. I have another older Western Digital with USB 2 and Firewire and that drive does not eject, only the one with the Super Speed USB 3. I have never lost any data because of the ejecting problem. Western Digital also suggested plugging the power source directly into an outlet, not into a strip, and plugging the USB 3 cable directly into the computer, not into a hub, but I don't think that worked either. I guess I'll just live with it for awhile and see if another Apple update solves the problem.

Still a mystery, with no consistent indicator of cause.

I've gotten lucky; no issues since replacing my external 4-bay enclosure, via warranty.

But I'm not convinced it's NOT an Apple hardware/firmware issue. It's worth repeating that my eject incidents go back to a recently-acquired 2008 Snow Leopard iMac. And then reappeared on a new 2013 iMac, now on El Capitan. In both cases, the problem only happened with the 4-bay enclosure, and not with multiple free-standing HDDs. The problem showed up when connected via FW800, USB2, USB3. I don't have a Thunderbolt external. No USB hubs.

I bring this up to underscore the wide variety of scenarios in which the eject issue happens. It still strikes me as some kind of voltage mismatch between the ports. If it is hardware-related, I wonder if PC users ever experience such issues; if not, that fact might create some insight.

The very last thing I did before the problem appeared on my 2013 El Capitan iMac was update my iPod Touch to the latest iOS. I used my live AppleCare status to discuss this with a tech/rep who seemed very knowledgeable. He thought that MAYBE the iOS update included a routine update to the iMac port drivers, but that wasn't definitive. But it does suggest that there is a delicate voltage(?) balance that needs to be struck between workstation and externals.

From reading here, it appears that Apple has closed the door on this, using the tried and true we-can't-replicate-the-issue rationale. They should at least keep the door open, and if nothing else take it into account for the next major OS update.

Since I don't have issues right now, I'll try to keep it that way. I just won't update the iPod Touch any more; it's not critical.

But it sure diminishes confidence in the It-Just-Works motto.

some sort of poor osx drivers.

I have tried several external usb drives with the same cables on ubuntu linux 15.10 and 16.04 and on different computers, both imacs and mac pro 15" retinas, always updated to latest osx versions. linux is rock solid and never has any trouble. osx does. random disconnects.

of course, it could be that apple is more pedantic and correct about usb specs, but in the end, these usb drives and cable combinations are stable on other machines but not on osx. afaik, apple does not sell or publish a list of approved external USB devices, so for all practical purposes, one may as well assume that any purchased external USB drive won't work. when it does not, one is on one's own.

maybe thunderbolt does better ?!

Dear All,

I have just purchased a new Western Digital My Book, which also uses USB 3SS, and that one has not given me any trouble thus far, but I will continue to use it and report in. The one giving me the problem is a Western Digital My Book Studio with the silver metal (aluminum?) case -- I wonder if that might have something to do with the problem. The new My Book has a plastic case.

Perhaps we'll figure it out before long. Mine ejected today shortly after I tried to use it with Adobe Bridge. It had not ejected from the desktop until I was moving quickly through the files with my Magic Mouse and zip, out it went. I unplugged it, plugged it back in, and it has been stable since then while working through Adobe Bridge photo files -- has not ejected again since this morning. I wonder if the Magic Mouse motion might be just too fast for it to keep up somehow -- just a thought.

Dear All,

I think they removed the "edit post" feature, so I'll have to reply again -- I wonder if temperature has anything to do with the ejection problem? Mine seems to eject MORE when it's cold, right after start-up, rather than after it's been powered on for awhile and is in use. It has the aluminum case, and perhaps the heat transfer features on the WD Mac Book Studio might be causing some sort of problem -- just a thought. I'll watch it to see if warmer summer weather affects the ejection problem in any way.

Thanks for the insight. I will swap out the USB3 for a much older firewire enclosure and see if that improves things on this non-backing-up backup disk.

Dear All,

Here's a new one I haven't experienced before! I was working with Adobe Bridge and it was trying to load images from a long list of photo file stored on my WD external hard drive. I left the room while Adobe was trying to load one particular file, and when I came back the "Disk not ejected properly" warning was on the desktop and it appeared that the WD had ejected itself, but it must have come back from the ejection by itself, because it still appeared in Adobe Bridge, although it just appeared as one of the available disks and no longer showed the long list of image files that were trying to load.

Maybe we aren't waiting long enough for the external drive to come back on by itself -- as I said above, this is a new one on me!

Dear All,

Another update -- I just noticed the "Disk not ejected properly" warning on my desktop, regarding the WD drive that's giving me the problem, but the disk is still visible and running on the desktop -- so why the ejection warning when the disk has not ejected? Unless it ejected the way it did yesterday and then came back on by itself. I was out of the room again so don't know what happened, but another strange occurrence.

Dear All,

Another update -- my latest WD MyBook for Mac with the plastic enclosure has also ejected itself while using Adobe Bridge. So now I have two WD drives that are randomly ejecting themselves, although it mostly happens when I'm using Adobe Bridge or Nikon's View NX software, working with photos. It's as if the external drives just can't keep up with the rapid scrolling and loading of images that is being demanded.

Just thought I'd keep everyone informed.