WD My Passport Ultra found with fdisk, only manual mounting is possible

zeebra · 07-31-2015, 07:40 AM

I have two identical external disks. One works fine and one does not work as expected. Both have same settings etc to them. We can also assume the cable is not the issue, since I use the same on both.

With the second defect disk:
- I have problems formatting it/disk utility does not find it and disk manager freezes in a strange way.
- It can only be found with "fdisk -l"
- It is only possible to mount it manually
- When mounted it seems to work just fine

With the working disk:
- diskmanagers find the disk automatically
- it shows as USB unit and as disk
- it can be formatted easily and without disk manager freezing
- it can mounted automatically or by single click.

Further info:
- Both disks are encrypted
- Both disks formatted with ext4
- Mageia4 with KDE & Doplhin and Kernel 3.14, X86_64

Most important bit:
- The defect disk has been swapped in the shop once. Because the first one had the same issue. I picked out an identical disk in the isles to replace it, and this disk had the same issue!

The working disk was the first one I bought. The second disk had the described issue, and it was swapped in the shop for a new one. The third disk has the described issue as well.

This leads me to think the issue might be a firmware issue in the disk. But I have not tested it in Windows.

If it is not a firmware issue, it could be a USB3 issue.
I have worked with several USB3 equipment in Windows which had issues, in particular any type of storage media.

Thirdly it could be a problem with the implementation of the driver in Linux, perhaps combined with some kind of firmware upgrade.

A last option I can think of is that this disk is also actually defect, although the chance is very small. It could have been produced during the period of issues in Thailand.

I am wondering how this could have happened, since one identical disk that I have, works perfect with all the same setting, same cable, same machine and same USB port. It might be an earlier batch disk, not sure.

The disk had the problem since the start. I am quite sure I was able to format it in the end, using the disk utility. I could have done it manually in terminal though. Not certain.

Any ideas?

smallpond · 07-31-2015, 08:02 AM

The problem disk might be a new advanced format disk. What is the output of:

Code:

sudo parted -l /dev/sdX

where X is the drive letter of the disk.

zeebra · 07-31-2015, 08:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by smallpond

The problem disk might be a new advanced format disk. What is the output of:

Code:

sudo parted -l /dev/sdX

where X is the drive letter of the disk.

Code:

Model: WD My Passport 0830 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdb: 2000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system  Flags
 1      1049kB  2000GB  2000GB  primary               boot


Model: Linux device-mapper (crypt) (dm)
Disk /dev/mapper/mypass: 2000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: loop
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start  End     Size    File system  Flags
 1      0.00B  2000GB  2000GB  ext4

There is no difference to the second disk except the name passport 0830 (defect) and 0820 (working). So its probable that the 0830 is a newer batch and possibly with new firmware.

But at least gparted worked.

Could be a bug with "drakdisk" which was probably used for the formatting and is what I am trying to use to check the disk in general and possibly format it again.

I think I will try another disk tool and see if that makes a difference.

zeebra · 07-31-2015, 08:35 AM

dmesg gives me this output when I connect the disk:

Code:

12410.330834] usb 4-2: new SuperSpeed USB device number 6 using xhci_hcd
[12410.342625] usb 4-2: New USB device found, idVendor=1058, idProduct=0830
[12410.342636] usb 4-2: New USB device strings: Mfr=2, Product=3, SerialNumber=1
[12410.342642] usb 4-2: Product: My Passport 0830
[12410.342646] usb 4-2: Manufacturer: Western Digital
[12410.342650] usb 4-2: SerialNumber: 575843314138344A31305A50
[12410.343375] usb-storage 4-2:1.0: USB Mass Storage device detected
[12410.343436] scsi11 : usb-storage 4-2:1.0
[12411.345369] scsi 11:0:0:0: Direct-Access     WD       My Passport 0830 1065 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6
[12411.346091] scsi 11:0:0:1: Enclosure         WD       SES Device       1065 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6
[12411.346162] ses 11:0:0:1: Attached Enclosure device
[12411.346907] ses 11:0:0:1: Failed to get diagnostic page 0x8000002
[12411.346928] ses 11:0:0:1: Failed to bind enclosure -19
[12411.347346] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] Spinning up disk...
[12412.348449] ......ready
[12417.362128] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] 3906963456 512-byte logical blocks: (2.00 TB/1.81 TiB)
[12417.362582] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] Write Protect is off
[12417.362586] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] Mode Sense: 53 00 10 08
[12417.362949] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] No Caching mode page found
[12417.362952] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] Assuming drive cache: write through
[12417.364009] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] No Caching mode page found
[12417.364011] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] Assuming drive cache: write through
[12417.505704]  sdd: sdd1
[12417.507075] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] No Caching mode page found
[12417.507078] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] Assuming drive cache: write through
[12417.507080] sd 11:0:0:0: [sdd] Attached SCSI disk
[12453.498514] usb 4-2: Disable of device-initiated U1 failed.
[12458.500739] usb 4-2: Disable of device-initiated U2 failed.
[12458.603133] usb 4-2: reset SuperSpeed USB device number 6 using xhci_hcd
[12458.614471] xhci_hcd 0000:00:14.0: xHCI xhci_drop_endpoint called with disabled ep ffff880098e9bb80
[12458.614488] xhci_hcd 0000:00:14.0: xHCI xhci_drop_endpoint called with disabled ep ffff880098e9bbc0

smallpond · 07-31-2015, 08:49 AM

"No caching mode page found" is a little weird, but nothing jumps out at me.

Have you seen this bug?
http://dev.ml.mageia.narkive.com/qsX...-with-drakdisk

zeebra · 07-31-2015, 12:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by smallpond

"No caching mode page found" is a little weird, but nothing jumps out at me.

Have you seen this bug?
http://dev.ml.mageia.narkive.com/qsX...-with-drakdisk

I know, it is strange, but I do not know exactly what it means.

Thanks for the link. I am not certain yet, but I have to map it out.

Additionally I found out that it worked fine on another computer with older distro, older kernel, older ecryption implementation. Perhaps I set the disk up on it, but it should also be possible to use disk manager to find and format the disk on my laptop, especially since it can on the other one.