Whoa, Lacie!! Help! Is my harddrive on its way out??

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thethingwiththestuff
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Whoa, Lacie!! Help! Is my harddrive on its way out??

Post by thethingwiththestuff » Mon Jan 08, 2007 10:41 am

Ok, i'm slightly freaking out over here. I work off a powerbook using a Lacie D2 160 gb FW800 7200 rpm external drive.

A few weeks ago, my girlfriend reached down to my powerstrip to plug her laptop in, and my harddrive, which was mounted at the time, hiccoughed a bit. turned off, and back on. It was in the middle of listening back to a session. I was able to calmly quit, remount the drive, and open back up. I attributed that to the plug getting a little jostled at the surge strip.

Last night, I came hom from work and found my drive had that little blue 'on' light lit, though the firewire was not connected and my laptop was with me at work. I used the blue button to turn it off.

This morning, my cellphone rang with a text message. It was on the top of my desk above the drive on the first shelf. Along with that "dit-ditdit-dit" sound through my speakers, the hard drive fucking popped to life! again, it was not connected to the laptop.

Is this the action of a dying hard drive, or just typical interference?

Yes, I plan on picking up a second external for backup anyway.

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Post by JGriffin » Mon Jan 08, 2007 10:52 am

I've found that cel phones can make computers do silly things. If my phone is on the desk next to my track ball the mouse moves and random things get clicked on.
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Post by Kilroy » Tue Jan 09, 2007 12:35 am

dwlb wrote:I've found that cel phones can make computers do silly things. If my phone is on the desk next to my track ball the mouse moves and random things get clicked on.
i was setting up sound at an ice show a couple weeks and when I was near the mixer i got a text and heard the digital beeping thing go through the sound system. It was awesome. I turned it off for the show of course.

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Jeff White
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Post by Jeff White » Tue Jan 09, 2007 8:19 am

If audio doesn't exist in three places it doesn't exist at all. Back that shit up!!! If your intellectual property is backed up over 3 hard drives (or DVD), then it's only a financial thing if your Lacie dies (I own the same drive, btw, and have never experienced weirdness).

I have my stuff backed up over three drives after sessions, and two at all times. I also run backups to my PB of all of the stuff that I do at work (graphic design) on an Intel iMac (in case of fire at the office... we publish three magazines four times a year!!!), and use the iMac at work to back up my studio stuff a third time.

Drives die. Everyday. Back it up today and don't worry about the drive dying. You can still use the case and load another hard drive inside of it.

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thethingwiththestuff
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Post by thethingwiththestuff » Tue Jan 09, 2007 8:49 am

ipressrecord wrote:If audio doesn't exist in three places it doesn't exist at all. Back that shit up!!! If your intellectual property is backed up over 3 hard drives (or DVD), then it's only a financial thing if your Lacie dies (I own the same drive, btw, and have never experienced weirdness).

I have my stuff backed up over three drives after sessions, and two at all times. I also run backups to my PB of all of the stuff that I do at work (graphic design) on an Intel iMac (in case of fire at the office... we publish three magazines four times a year!!!), and use the iMac at work to back up my studio stuff a third time.

Drives die. Everyday. Back it up today and don't worry about the drive dying. You can still use the case and load another hard drive inside of it.

Jeff
yeah, i back up to dvd and i want to add another drive to get up to the "3 places" ideal. i think i can relax and assume all this acting up is pretty easily explained away.

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asw.3060
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Post by asw.3060 » Tue Jan 09, 2007 9:19 am

i've had 3 Lacie d2 external drives die on me.
i'm done with that company.

-asw-

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Jeff White
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Post by Jeff White » Tue Jan 09, 2007 9:25 am

asw000 wrote:i've had 3 Lacie d2 external drives die on me.
i'm done with that company.

-asw-
Did you open up the case? What manufacture's drives are in the Lacie case? I have a 160GB D2 at home and we use 250GB D2s at work. Zero issues so far. (knock on wood!)

What do you guys recommend as a *VERY RELIABLE* backup drive/enclosure? Just curious.

Jeff

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Post by thethingwiththestuff » Tue Jan 09, 2007 9:36 am

asw000 wrote:i've had 3 Lacie d2 external drives die on me.
i'm done with that company.

-asw-
see, i hear this all the time. i've had mine for a couple years with no problems, except these couple weird things. i gotta ask, how did you treat them?

i saw on prosoundweb terry manning uses and recommends these: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire ... iteclassic

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Post by Jeff White » Tue Jan 09, 2007 10:46 am

thethingwiththestuff wrote: i saw on prosoundweb terry manning uses and recommends these: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire ... iteclassic
I wonder if they have the Oxford 911 chipset? I am assuming... yes. I'll let my gf know about these. She needs an external w/FW 800 for VJing. She's buying a MacBook Pro next week.

I have a 3.5 year old Glyph 120 NetDrive. Same case, Oxford chipset. I think that I am going to open it up and place a 320-500GB FW drive in it and pull out the older 120GB drive. Same case as the elite Classic, very reliable drive for me.

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Post by knobtwirler » Wed Jan 10, 2007 4:58 am

About the Oxford 911 chipset, if it is a FW400 enclosure it has the Oxford 911 chipset. There is no such thing nowadays as a FW400 external drive without an Oxford 911 chipset.

knobtwirler
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Post by knobtwirler » Wed Jan 10, 2007 5:19 am

thethingwiththestuff wrote:
asw000 wrote:i've had 3 Lacie d2 external drives die on me.
i'm done with that company.

-asw-
see, i hear this all the time. i've had mine for a couple years with no problems, except these couple weird things. i gotta ask, how did you treat them?

i saw on prosoundweb terry manning uses and recommends these: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire ... iteclassic
I've seen those drives around a lot, they are a nice cheap effective thing to get. What I liek about the d2 is that you never have to touch a power switch unless you deliberately want to turn it off or on, otherwise it is automatic, and it gives you the option of standing it up, laying it down, or rackmounting multiple drives against each other. Sometimes the power supply (that plastic brick with the green light) could go bad, so perhaps the strange behavior is attributed to this. Maybe you can try a friend's power brick from his/her d2?

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Post by DryCounty » Fri Jan 12, 2007 10:44 am

I too am done with Lacie -- I see the d2 enclosure fail time and again regardless of what drive is inside (usually Seagates, but I have seen some with Hitachis).

I recommend a company called Weibetech:

http://www.wiebetech.com

They have a slew of enclosures all with the latest chipsets. Very reliable.
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thethingwiththestuff
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Post by thethingwiththestuff » Fri Jan 12, 2007 11:02 am

yes, i do have several friends with d2's who's transformer i could borrow. good idea. i'm gonna keep watching this and see what happens.

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Post by rydaken » Fri Jan 12, 2007 6:14 pm

One thing, Lacie recommends not plugging in the drive to a computer, until AFTER the discs have fully spun up. Turn it on, listen for the discs to finish spinning, then insert firewire cable. I have yet to have a problem with any of their drives since putting this into practice.

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