My Book Studio II failing [SOLVED]

Hi,

While there are several other discussions on this drive, I can’t find one perfectly fitting my case. So please let me add this new topic.

System: Mac mini with Mavericks (10.9.5). External drive: My Book Studio II 2T. Other drives: two My Book 3T.

First day

The MBSII is usually connected via FireWire 800. It is the drive I use for video editing. It is used very seldom, since video making/editing has not been my main job for a few years.

Starting from a few days ago, it got disconnected. When riconnected, its content appeared only very, very slowly (some minutes to show the directory). At the same time, it slowed down the Finder. The LEDs were continuously moving up and down.

Disk Utility could not verify, nor repair it. The message said that it could not repair it, without saying more.

Second day

I let it switched off for a night. Then reconnected it, and this time the LEDs were flashing fast (one time per second), as if it was overheating. But it was off, disconnected from power, all the night. And touching it does not reveal any heat.

I connected it via USB. Disk Utility can see it, verify and repair it. No repair was needed, but it updated it for booting (I didn’t request this, but it did). The content can be seen in the Finder, but at an extremely slow pace (again, minutes before showing something).

Older days

This drive is a replacement from another My Book Studio II drive that at a certain point had the same troubles. It happened, like now, while I was not using it. At the time, WD could not offer any solution, other than replacing my drive. Now, this new drive does the same.

Is is a software of hardware issue? Should I try to repair it, or dismantle it and use the internal drive in non-WD external cases instead?

Thank you for any hint you can offer!

Paolo

Hello,

To make sure that you dont loose any data, keep your data in two different locations.

As a recommendation, try to test the unit on a different computer and if possible with different cables.

Always make sure to connect the power cable directly to the wall outlet to make sure that the unit is getting enough power.

1 Like

ER, thank you very much for your hints. I tried with a different computer (still a Mac with Mavericks), the power supply unit directly connected to the wall socket. No difference: the LEDs are still flashing each second, and the drive’s content cannot be accessed.

However, you say about “receiving enough power”. Maybe the PSU is damaged, and cannot give the drive enough power? Are the LEDs flashing maybe also an indicator of low current?

Paolo

Problem solved! With the help of the Italian WD support, and some ingenuity on my side, the drive is working again.

  • I let the drive off for a day, and then waited for its LEDs to flash slowly (standby).

  • I connected it to my Mac (Mavericks) via USB.

  • Run Disk Utility, and formatted the volume (not the drive).

It worked. When reconnecting the My Book Studio II via Firewire 800, I could copy the previous content from a backup. Then I let Time Machine back it up again. At the moment, it seems to work fine again.

What cause this issue? It happened while I was doing nothing with the drive. Maybe it was still the old incompatibility between WD Drive Utility and Mavericks, caused by the WDDriveUtilityHelper app I found running from the /private/var/ directory?

Paolo

Hi,

It did it again, exactly as the first time. Suddenly, it unmounted and the lights started moving up and down.

I let it do this for a couple hours, then disconnected and reconnected it.

When back, the leds started flashing.

I’m losing any trust in these drives.

Paolo

The drive started working again a few days after. I did nothing to recover it: just left it disconnected. Now it works, but it is very slow. Not unusable, but slower than USB drives.

Paolo