DSM-G600, DNS-3xx and NSA-220 Hack Forum

DNS-323 Talker · 2009-03-07 00:23:04

I know this is not on topic - I apologize, but I'm totally stumped/flummoxed, and this forum has the most technically knowledgeable members I know of...hoping I'll get a pity-pass on this bit of forum abuse.

I have a problem that is keeping me from backing up my data on my DNS-323.

I have several USB drive enclosures that I've used w/my computers at home for a few years. I swap hard drives in and out of them as needed, and use one in particular for backing up my DNS-323 each night.

In just the last couple of days I've discovered that my PC won't allow me to access any of my external USB drives connected to it - the icon for the drive shows up in My Computer when I connect the drive, the drive is listed as available for disconnect via the "Safely remove hardware" icon in the system tray, and the drive shows up normally in Disk Management in the Computer Management app.

However, if I double-click on the drive icon in my computer (or try to access the drive in other manners) I get an error dialog that says there was an I/O error. I've searched the web and haven't found any suggestions that helped resolve my problem. This is occurring with three different USB hard drive enclosures and four different hard drives, w/swapping between enclosures to test different combos of enclosures and hard drives, and three different USB cables, three different USB ports. A USB flash drive works fine on the same ports. So it doesn't look like a HW issue.

PC is Windows XP SP3, on HP Media Center PC that's about 2-3 years old. Nothing special about the PC...HW is stock from HP.

More info from my trouble-shooting:

1. There aren't any drive-letter conflicts (and I did remap one drive in Disk Management to "S:" just to be sure), but confirmed I'm not getting multiple drives mapping to the same letter.
2. The drives/enclosures work fine on other computers
3. USB flash drives work fine on the computer using the same ports that fail w/the USB hard drives
4. I'm only using the built-in USB ports on the PC, no USB hubs involved
5. I've tried deleting all entries under the "Universal Serial Bus Controllers" section in Device Manager and rebooting to reinstall the drivers, didn't help.
6. I have no problems showing up in Device Manager - all items look normal, no yellow exclamation marks anywhere
7. I've rebooted multiple times
8. No new software/hardware installed recently

I really appreciate any assistance on this...I'm going to open up the PC tonight and add one of my hard drives to it for a temporary backup solution, but since I swap two backup drives between home and work monthly (so I always have a full backup off-site), that's not a good long-term solution.

jdoering · 2009-03-07 10:03:16

No clue on what's wrong. How about trying to boot with a Linux boot CD and mount the usb enclosure to confirm whether or not it's a hardware issue.

If linux can mount the thing then it seems like a Windows problem of some kind; if Linux can't mount it either than hardware seems very suspect.

DNS-323 Talker · 2009-03-07 10:34:34

Thanks...doesn't it seem that since the ports work with other USB flash drive, that it must be a SW/driver type issue?

Your post made me realized that I haven't yet checked to see if our camera and ipods connect OK via the USB ports.

I think I have an Ubuntu disc around that I can try...

fordem · 2009-03-07 16:10:07

This is a stab in the dark but, I think, worth a try - best case scenario - it fixes the problem, and I have seen it fix a couple of situations where only one USB flash drive would work on a particular system, worst case scenario - you're no better off than before, and no worse off.

This is an extension of the "delete all the USB controllers and reload" tactic - but instead, what it does is delete all the USB peripheral drivers that remain loaded even though they are not visible in the device manager when the device is unplugged. I know it works on XP Pro, I haven't tried it on anything else.

Open a command prompt and type the following ...

set devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices=1
devmgmt.msc

The first command sets a switch, the second command opens the device manager snap in - when the device manager opens, click view and check show hidden devices and then expand the USB Serial Bus Controller item - you should see every device ever installed listed, those that are "greyed out" are the nonpresent ones and can be deleted safely, the drivers will reinstall when you reconnect the particular device.

If you like you can open the device manager, using either the normal methods, or the devmgmt.msc CLI command, before issuing the switch command and have two device manager windows open and compare the results of having the switch on and off - it's usually quite dramatic and at least for me, fascinating (yeah - I know little things amuse little minds)

Hopefully - this'll fix it.

Last edited by fordem (2009-03-07 16:15:09)

DNS-323 Talker · 2009-03-08 21:46:58

Thanks very much, Fordem.

I had a ton of stuff listed (that was greyed out) including several "unkown device" entries.

Uninstalling entries now...

DNS-323 Talker · 2009-03-08 23:16:42

Sigh...looks like it didn't help.

I cleared every entry in the USB Serial Bus Controller section, as well as a bunch of old drives listed under the Disk Drives section, and volumes in the Storage Volume section (including three that had strange characters in their names).

Rebooted, and everything else works fine, no devices showing up in device manager w/any problems.

Connected one of the USB drives, and shows up in My Computer, also in Disk Management as if it's OK, no drive letter conflicts. However, the autoplay dialog only runs for a few seconds and then just disappears. If I get properties on any of my USB drives it takes a long time, and comes up showing 0 bytes available/free, RAW for the file system.

Man...this is a tough one. How can everything appear to be fine, yet none of my USB drives/enclsures work!?

I also ran PC Doctor on the computer and the motherboard/system testing all comes up green, no problems.

Then connected that same enclosure/drive to my laptop and it comes up and works perfectly.

I was thinking I'd go get a USB port PCI card to add to the computer, but if this is a SW issue, that's not going to help. At this point does anything point more to HW or SW failure?

mig · 2009-03-09 02:02:18

DNS-323 Talker wrote:
Man...this is a tough one...

I have to agree. I have one suggestion (kind of a shot in the dark)
when really bizarre things start to happen on a computer system, I
begin to think there may be malicious code running which is responsible.

Have you tried to boot into safe mode and run a virus check or tried
connecting the UBS enclosure in safe mode?

If connecting the drive directly to the motherboard worked, and you
have an available 5.25" bay, you could try a removable drive tray
like http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a … 6817994020
so you don't have to keep opening up your case.

DNS-323 Talker · 2009-03-09 02:41:20

Thanks...I run updated Symantec on it and pretty much just my wife uses the PC, so the general risk is pretty low, but I'll give that a try, worth it to narrow things down.

I used to use removable trays...I may actually might even have an old one laying around.

I opened the case to put the drive inside and then realized that it's IDE, not SATA. I do have a spare port on the IDE cable connecting my CD/DVD drive to the mobo. But, I seem to remember that it may not be a good idea to put a HD and CD/DVD on the same cable. Is that an issue?

DNS-323 Talker · 2009-03-09 18:20:40

As Spock would say, "Interesting."

Booted to Safe mode and the usb drive worked perfectly.

I'm doing a full system scan now to see if Norton finds anything.

So maybe there is some bad code hanging around, or some drivers not getting loaded during Safe mode are interfering.

DNS-323 Talker · 2009-03-10 04:10:21

Scan completed...nothing found other than 1 tracking cookie. First time I ever wished I had a virus or something.

Rebooted to normal mode, everything is fine again. Drive works normally, I can copy to from it, access all directories, etc.

What the heck!? I've had some weird things going on in the past on other computers that have been resolved (seemingly) by booting to Safe mode, but usually those involved situations when windows just wouldn't start.

But I love a happy ending.

From now on my troubleshooting steps will always include:

1. Boot to Safe mode
2. Boot to normal mode

Thanks for the assistance and patience w/my OT difficulties.

DSM-G600, DNS-3xx and NSA-220 Hack Forum

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#1 2009-03-07 00:23:04

OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#2 2009-03-07 10:03:16

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#3 2009-03-07 10:34:34

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#4 2009-03-07 16:10:07

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#5 2009-03-08 21:46:58

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#6 2009-03-08 23:16:42

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#7 2009-03-09 02:02:18

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

DNS-323 Talker wrote:

#8 2009-03-09 02:41:20

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#9 2009-03-09 18:20:40

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

#10 2009-03-10 04:10:21

Re: OT: Can't backup DNS-323 data to USB drive

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