Mobile USB 3.0 hard drive disconnecting for no reason

I'm using a fileserver with CentOS Linux release 7.5.1804 and I keep having a problem with my WD Passport 1TB drive disconnecting for no apparent reason. When it does this, I cannot in any way get it to mount again on that system until I do a reboot. This has only started to happen very recently, and no other computer seems to suffer this problem with this drive.

The problem persists even though I bought a powered USB 3.0 hub to connect the drive.

My fileserver uses a Gigabyte M68MT-S2P motherboard.

Please see this Pastebin for the error output when I try to re-mount the drive.
https://pastebin.com/XdDEu9Rg

What's wrong and how can I fix it?

Well, it says it's using ohci-hcd as a module. That's usb-1.0. xhci is the usb-3 module, isn't it?

I wopuld look up the status errors. If they're the same as error numbers, you can find them in /usr/include/asm-generic/errno-base.h

Originally Posted by business_kid Well, it says it's using ohci-hcd as a module. That's usb-1.0. xhci is the usb-3 module, isn't it? I wopuld look up the status errors. If they're the same as error numbers, you can find them in /usr/include/asm-generic/errno-base.h

I think you're right. How would I get Linux to use xhci instead of ohci?

Better yet how would I be able to reset the bus?

Please see this output for information:
https://pastebin.com/c2TZ81Rp

I tried

# sudo echo -n "0000:00:02.0" | tee /sys/bus/pci/drivers/ohci-pci/bind

But I only got:

0000:00:02.0tee: /sys/bus/pci/drivers/ohci-pci/bind: No such device

I know I'm doing it wrong. Instructions for resetting the USB bus are quite confusing...

Randomly disconnecting and using the "wrong" driver can both be caused by problems with the physical USB port. Have you switched port recently? Could the port itself be worn, or one of the internal connections loose?

I had a box once that was supposedly all USB 2.0, but some of the ports would only work if I disabled the relevant module so that it fell beck to ohci. I suspect they were detected as USB2 but didn't properly implement the standard.

Originally Posted by Pastychomper Randomly disconnecting and using the "wrong" driver can both be caused by problems with the physical USB port. Have you switched port recently? Could the port itself be worn, or one of the internal connections loose? I had a box once that was supposedly all USB 2.0, but some of the ports would only work if I disabled the relevant module so that it fell beck to ohci. I suspect they were detected as USB2 but didn't properly implement the standard.

It happens on every port that I use with this device. Once it disconnects, no port (not even a newly attached external hubs) will let me mount the hard drive until I reboot. But only on one machine. I don't even see where my machine uses xhci or ehci, or how to enable it. I'm using kernel 3.10.0-862.11.6.el7.x86_64. I can't find a way to enable x/ehci or reset it...

Actually, in further, desperate experiments I found that I cannot re-mount to the same mount point (directory) that I used before, even if I "umount /mountpoint -l", rm -rf /mountpoint and mkdir /mountpoint I cannot mount to that directory name ever again until reboot.

But if I create /mountpoint1 I can re-mount to that.

WTF is this wild new brand of crazy.

check /etc/mtab or /proc/mounts to see if it's actually unmounted. cat is handiest.

mount --bind dir1 dir2 might find application

Anyhow, this looks like a distro problem, not a usb drive problem. Try it on a hard disk partition, and a usb key. Then giove them hell.

Originally Posted by business_kid check /etc/mtab or /proc/mounts to see if it's actually unmounted. cat is handiest. mount --bind dir1 dir2 might find application Anyhow, this looks like a distro problem, not a usb drive problem. Try it on a hard disk partition, and a usb key. Then giove them hell.

Nothing unusual showed up in mtab or mounts. No application was bound to the directories.

Is the disk there after you unmount it? Usually mounting/unmounting requires root. Anything mounted on bootup or in unusual places, ore with unusual options requires root privileges. If your usb drive is sdb1, try

cat /etc/mtab |grep sdb1

before and after mounts and unmounts.

Originally Posted by business_kid Is the disk there after you unmount it? Usually mounting/unmounting requires root. Anything mounted on bootup or in unusual places, ore with unusual options requires root privileges. If your usb drive is sdb1, try cat /etc/mtab |grep sdb1 before and after mounts and unmounts.

I did, still no entry found.

Edit: Wait, yes, it happened again and this time I found an entry. umount -l on that entry re-enabled use of the drive without rebooting.

I'll go with this temporary solution for a week and if it keeps working then mark it as solved. This bug has kept evolving over the last year...

From the unount man page:

Note that a file system cannot be unmounted when it is 'busy' - for example, when there are open files on it, or when some
process has its working directory there, or when a swap file on it is in use.  The offending process could even be  umount
itself - it opens libc, and libc in its turn may open for example locale files.  A lazy unmount avoids this problem.

It's usually good to run 'lsof |grep sdb1' or whatever the usb is if you're having suspicious stuff from umount. Alternatively 'lsof | grep mount/point (trim the initial forward slash to avoid regex type nonsense - always a possibility)

Maybe try mounting it with its UUID(?).