Usb Drive content seems to dissappear

Help and Support
1

Hi.
I´ve running last updaate of OSMC on an RPI 3, with a 1tb external drive usb attached, ntfs format. The drive is also shared to my win7 laptop through smb-shares.conf file.
Until now, i´ve had no problems at all.

But since a few days, anytime i try to transfer files from the laptop to the pi (with destination on the atached usb drive), the operation always fail after a while, showing an error saying just that it is impossible to complete the operation, and next the disk is showing just “empty”. If i browse directly on the pi, it´s the same.
If i reboot the system, all just seems fine again, with all my files and the drive mounted.
If i try a new transfer, goes to the same again…If i try to play a movie, it just stops suddenly after 6 o 7 minutes, and then again the disk is showing as “empty”, until a new reboot.
I´ve checked the disk for bad sectors or hardware failure, but it´s perfectly ok (it has 3 months of use).
I´ve reformated the disk to ext4, and i have the same behaviour.
Tried transfers through smb and ftp, same problem…

I can´t say for sure if this is related to the last recent update, but i think the issue begins with that.
I can´t see nothing related on the last logs. It just seems the disk is unmounted minutes after a transfer or movie play starts… or is deniyng permissions…

I konw my explanation is not very clear, but i appreciatte any possible help with this.
Thanks in advance.

UPDATE:
Did some more tests, transfer a couple of small files, all of them fine, but failed to create a folder.
Transfer a file sized 11 Gb, failed when reached about 9 Gb size…

2

Is the drive powered via USB, or a seperate power supply? If it’s powered via usb, try adding max_usb_current=1 to /boot/config.txt, or use a powered usb hub.

3

It´s directly to the usb, had no problems until now with that. Also tried that option you suggest, no luck.

4

I’d recommend that you try a powered usb hub. A spinning drive may be to much for the Pi to power.

[Edit] You did reboot after adding max_usb_current, right?

5

With 3 months 24/7 fully working ok until now ?? I don´t think that may be the solution to the issue, maybe a workaround in case… But i want to know what´s causing this.
Much appreciated, regards.

6

Your power supply could be weak. They do degrade over time. Or, have you added any other USB devices lately?

7

Power is 2.5 A, and just repeat, all the set (RPI 3 and all cables or devices) has no more than 3 months. No new usb devices added. Just like from the start, the usb hdd and a bluetooth dongle for a minikeyboard remote.

8

Added some more info to the OP:

Did some more tests, transfer a couple of small files, all of them fine, but failed to create a folder.
Transfer a file sized 11 Gb, failed when reached about 9 Gb size…

9

Some more:
After replicating the issue another time, i´ve checked the storage tab and now it shows the usb drive is mounted on /dev/sdb1/ … So, it seems its mounted on sda1 on fresh start and then fails and mounts on sdb1… ¿¿???

10

Sounds like the drive is un-mounting and re-mounting. Really seems to me that it’s power related.

11

Now this seems really weird… I´ve changed the propietary usbe cable supported from Western Digital when purchased the external hdd (the one who has a “double” micro usb connector) with another generic usb to micro usb i had left on a drawer…
Guess what… It seems the issue is gone ¿?¿ Made a few large transfers and the completed 100% without problems…
Gonna do some more huge and massive transfers to check, but, i can´t understand the reason of this happening.

You still bet to a power issue ???

12

I sure do! The Y USB cable was drawing twice the power from the Pi. That’s the purpose of that cable. I’m surprised that it works at all with a regular cable, but glad to hear that it works.

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