External enclosure and delay write failed

[Will Rickards]

Previous Thread
http://www.storageforum.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4353

Quick Summary:
Delay Write Failed messages out the ying yang!

Longer Version:
So I have a Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 160GB.
And an enclosure with firewire 400 and usb 2.0 ports.
I'm using the firewire 400 as I only have USB 1 or 1.1.
The firewire is the oxford chipset.
No drivers loaded for win2k as it natively saw it.

I installed the drive and formatted through disk management just fine (NTFS 4K clusters - @140 GB primary partition). I changed the drive letter to X for External Backup and because I don't want it to change when I futz with the drives in about a month.

Then I try an xcopy script for backup. Delayed write failed messages out the ying yang. They are about $MFT and $Bitmap and some other stuff. Then the drive disappears from My Computer. So I reboot.
I install this backup software that came with the seagate drive. Same problem, only the backup program continues like nothing is wrong and at the end tells me there were errors and to look at the log. There is no way to get to the log from the app.

My primary hard drive is off a PCI Sil680 controller card.
The external drive is off a PCI firewire card I got with Pinnacle Studio.
It worked fine for my video captures.

I tried to disable the write cache through windows but the setting doesn't work. At this point I don't know what to do. I'm thinking I need a new driver.

 

[Mercutio]

I'd be inclined to try a different cable, first.

 

[mubs]

All good cables, whatever type (USB, FW, etc.) seem to have the choke (the tubular, bulbous thing normally found on analog video cables) at least at one end. Even the retail pack of a cheapo 64MB flash drive I bought had a 3 ft. USB extension cable with the choke at one end. I just checked my WD (!!) external USB/FW hard drive - the data cables don't have the choke, but the wire from the power brick that plugs into the drive does.

In the aftermarket, it's nearly impossible to find data cables with the choke. I've tried. Maybe somebody can explain if it's really important or not.

Along the same lines of thought, I've found many "off-brand" USB/FW chipsets don't work right (especially that Ali POS). I stick to name-brand cards with TI/NEC chipsets for FW, and these have worked flawlessly for me.

 

[Pradeep]

Granite Digital FW cables have baluns - and prices to match

 

[MaxBurn]

I just had a similar problem only with USB 2.0 and it turned out to be the cable. Also if you are using Norton the auto protect locks up the system for a long time while it scans files for viruses in the new files you just created with the backup. Not a problem with small files but if you move a couple big iso's over it can cause lots of problems. How does the drive check out if it's internal? Run a check on it with seatools?

 

[Will Rickards]

Well I tried the USB port and it seems to be working fine. (backup is proceeding slowly)
I'm going to try the firewire port on another computer tomorrow to see what is up with that.

 

[Will Rickards]

Well USB works just fine.
So at this point I know it is something firewire.
Where can I get a good cable, relatively inexpensive?
I looked at granite digital and they want almost as much as the whole enclosure cost me.

I knew I should have took pictures of the chips on the board on the enclosure before I put it together. It is damn near impossible to get apart again.

I guess it is a case of you get what you pay for.
I should have bucked up and bought the more expensive one.

 

[Will Rickards]

This site
http://www.bustrace.com/products/delayedwrite.htm
appears highly relevant.

It appears the firewire implementation in windows is mostly a POS.

 

[Pradeep]

Reading thru that, and then to the MS article, it looks like SP2 sets FW speed to 100Mbit/sec? What kind of massive f### up is that? This should be a critical/recommended update, not something hidden in the KB.

Thanks for the link BTW.

 

[Will Rickards]

Well I found an article that is exactly my problem:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/885464
Unfortunately they say Windows XP only and even after contacting MS support they still think it is XP only.
I went through round one with MS support but round two seems daunting.
So I decided firewire in windows sucks ass.
So I ordered a combo firewire 400/USB 2.0 card.
Specifically this syba one with an Ali chipset from newegg.

The firewire card in my machine came with Pinnacle Studio 7.
It has an Agere FW323-05 chip on it.

Now maybe you all are going to tell me Ali sucks or something but it was only $22.50 shipped. And now maybe I can transfer pictures faster too.

 

[mubs]

Will: sorry, but ALi does suck, big time.

I have FW PCI cards made by Adaptec and Belkin, and they both work perfectly. I bought a Syba 2-port FW Cardbus card ($20) for my laptop, and had to send it back because it was really flaky. I bought an Adaptec card ($60) that has been absolutely reliable.

This page on Apple's website lists FireWire and USB Cards recommended for the iPod. Take that as an indication that Apple has shaken these out, tested them rigorously, if they're willing to recommend them on their website.

 

[Will Rickards]

Okay then, cancelled that order. No need for more problems.
The chipset choices I've found are NEC, Ali, and VIA.
So I decided for a fourth choice, NEC + TI at other world computing.

 

[Pradeep]

I have an OrangeMicro combo USB2/FW400 card (TI+NEC) and never had any probs. Also have an OWC FW800 card that works well.

 

[MaxBurn]

I have a belkin that's based on the Texas Instruments chipset. I picked up lots of comments on a video capture forum recomending it and I havn't had a problem with it at all.

 

[Will Rickards]

Well I tried out the MS support staffs round 2 of suggestions.
One of the steps was to download the latest driver for the pinnacle firewire card. And while I couldn't find a driver there for my firewire card, I did find a PCI Performance Enhancer. I discounted this originally because nothing on the page for it indicates what the heck it does. Well it solved my problems. 30GB in 9 hours with USB. 30GB in 45 minutes with the firewire card. No delay write failed messages, it just worked.

So I cancelled the order for the other world computing card. I don't need the USB 2.0 functionality. USB 2.0 would have been nice but I'd rather not put throw that money away as it wouldn't be needed in a new computer.

 

[mubs]

Glad you got it resolved. On paper, USB 2.0 is faster, but in practice, FW-400 is faster than USB 2.0.

 

[Bookmage]

you know, I had this same problem with my firewire drives in win 2K.
I had two dual enclosures running 2 x WD 120s in them on the oxford chipset and they would give me the whole msft delayed write fail thing. I swapped ports and cables... with each.... and got them working when I needed to. It was really inconvenient. I sold one of the enclosures and the guy didn't have a problem with it. The other one has been running for over two years without a problem since then. I'm guessing it was either bad drives, cuz someone along the way I think there was an SP or two that came out, or having two enclosures on the same POS firewire card had problems.

Just last month though, the computer stopped recognizing the enclosure entirely. I didn't have a spare firewire cable, and suspect its either the cable or the controller card in the thing. I remember googling for info sometime last year and coming across those pages which semi addressed the issues in XP. However, the fixes and workarounds were kind of random and more plug and pray than I wanted. The drives are working in a different computer now and I may take it apart one day. One of these days, I may give up a kidney to get the better stuff from granite digital, but for now, I'll just run an extra comp w/ bigger drives.... :-/

So the lesson is still the same... Firewire > USB2,
OS X > XP (at least in the firewire part)

Good quality = $$$, cheap $$$ = Lots of wasted time and headaches :-/

 

[Will Rickards]

Spoke too soon?
I turned on the monitor today to find the night's backup listing problems with delay write failed.
I'm not playing anymore with this pinnacle card.
I'm reordering the OWC card with the TI and NEC chipsets.

 

[CityK]

it looks like SP2 sets FW speed to 100Mbit/sec? What kind of massive f### up is that? This should be a critical/recommended update, not something hidden in the KB.

I noticed the other day that MS had a revised hotfix for this problem:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/885222