Large file corruption using external USB drive

[me]

I'm having problems with my newly bought Xcraft RX-3HU USB2 enclosure.

I fitted a new Seagate 250GB Ultra ATA100 hard drive (ST 3250820A).
My system runs WinXP SP2 and the USB2 is integral to the motherboard.
On boot XP sees the drive fine.
I fdisked and formated the drive (NTFS).
I can copy files to and from the drive.

The problem occurs when I copy large files over.

I used the included P&G software at first but wanted more flexibility so used
Ghost V9 (and 10) and also tried Acronis True Image (V9). Both failed on backup
saying the backup on the Xcraft USB drive was corrupt.
So I copied a couple of files over to the Xcraft drive using Windows Explorer
and the file sizes were reported the same compared to the originals. One file I
copied was a 2GB avi file. When the original is played from the main system
drive it plays fine. When played from the Xcraft drive I notice audio crackling
and color blocks on the video. I copied the Xcraft version of the file back to
the main drive and tried to play it again and got the same audio/video problems.
Appears the the version on the USB drive is corrupted.
( I also did a backup using Ghost and TrueImage to my main system drive and they
verified OK. So did the files when using P&G).

I copied a variety of files over to the Xcraft of differing sizes and then used
good old "fc/b" (file compare/ binary) from the WinXP command prompt window to
compare the original against the ones copied to the Xcraft.
Here's what I got -
88MB compared OK
440MB OK
608MB OK
757MB OK
943MB Numerous differences
1.4GB Numerous differences

It seems that anything much above 757MB gets corrupted when copied to the
Xcraft.

I also used a different hard drive in the Xcraft (freshly fdisked and formatted)
and got the same results.

Any ideas what the problem might be?

 

[Arno Wagner]

I'm having problems with my newly bought Xcraft RX-3HU USB2 enclosure.

I fitted a new Seagate 250GB Ultra ATA100 hard drive (ST 3250820A).
My system runs WinXP SP2 and the USB2 is integral to the motherboard.
On boot XP sees the drive fine.
I fdisked and formated the drive (NTFS).
I can copy files to and from the drive.

The problem occurs when I copy large files over.

I used the included P&G software at first but wanted more flexibility so used
Ghost V9 (and 10) and also tried Acronis True Image (V9). Both failed on backup
saying the backup on the Xcraft USB drive was corrupt.
So I copied a couple of files over to the Xcraft drive using Windows Explorer
and the file sizes were reported the same compared to the originals. One file I
copied was a 2GB avi file. When the original is played from the main system
drive it plays fine. When played from the Xcraft drive I notice audio crackling
and color blocks on the video. I copied the Xcraft version of the file back to
the main drive and tried to play it again and got the same audio/video problems.
Appears the the version on the USB drive is corrupted.
( I also did a backup using Ghost and TrueImage to my main system drive and they
verified OK. So did the files when using P&G).

I copied a variety of files over to the Xcraft of differing sizes and then used
good old "fc/b" (file compare/ binary) from the WinXP command prompt window to
compare the original against the ones copied to the Xcraft.
Here's what I got -
88MB compared OK
440MB OK
608MB OK
757MB OK
943MB Numerous differences
1.4GB Numerous differences

It seems that anything much above 757MB gets corrupted when copied to the
Xcraft.

I also used a different hard drive in the Xcraft (freshly fdisked and formatted)
and got the same results.

Any ideas what the problem might be?

A primary suspect is the RAM of your PC. The idea is like follows: The
larger the files the more memory is used for buffering. If the RAM fault
is placed right, only large copy actions will touch it.

Run memtest86+ (-> Google) for a few hours or longer and see whether
it finds problems.

Arno

 

[me]

A primary suspect is the RAM of your PC. The idea is like follows: The
larger the files the more memory is used for buffering. If the RAM fault
is placed right, only large copy actions will touch it.

Run memtest86+ (-> Google) for a few hours or longer and see whether
it finds problems.

Arno

Thanks for the suggestion Arno.
I'll give it a try but this is a pretty new system I put together a few months
ago with 2GB of matched RAM. Since I built it I've been working extensively
editing multi-gig video files and I think I may have had problems prior to this
if there was a memory problem.

Jeff

 

[Arno Wagner]

A primary suspect is the RAM of your PC. The idea is like follows: The
larger the files the more memory is used for buffering. If the RAM fault
is placed right, only large copy actions will touch it.

Run memtest86+ (-> Google) for a few hours or longer and see whether
it finds problems.

Arno

[/QUOTE]

Thanks for the suggestion Arno. I'll give it a try but this is a
pretty new system I put together a few months ago with 2GB of
matched RAM. Since I built it I've been working extensively editing
multi-gig video files and I think I may have had problems prior to
this if there was a memory problem.

Give it a try. If the data is moved to USB disk, the memory acces
pattern may just be the tiny bit differently needed to produce
a consistent problem.

If you don't find any RAM problem, the next step is to find out
what exactly the error patterns look like. Since this is more
work, I would suggest the RAM test first.

Arno

 

[Yousuf Khan]

I'm having problems with my newly bought Xcraft RX-3HU USB2 enclosure.

I fitted a new Seagate 250GB Ultra ATA100 hard drive (ST 3250820A).
My system runs WinXP SP2 and the USB2 is integral to the motherboard.
On boot XP sees the drive fine.
I fdisked and formated the drive (NTFS).
I can copy files to and from the drive.

The problem occurs when I copy large files over.

Your problem sounds somewhat like the XP SP1 USB bug, but you have SP2
installed.

Download the Windows XP USB Update
http://www.softwarepatch.com/windows/winxpusb.html

Patch Available for USB Isochronous Data Transfers Issues
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307271

Also you didn't mention what kind of motherboard and chipset your
computer is running.

Yousuf Khan

 

[Arno Wagner]

Your problem sounds somewhat like the XP SP1 USB bug, but you have SP2
installed.

Download the Windows XP USB Update
http://www.softwarepatch.com/windows/winxpusb.html

Patch Available for USB Isochronous Data Transfers Issues
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307271

Also you didn't mention what kind of motherboard and chipset your
computer is running.

Yousuf Khan

Right. Should have guessed that Microsoft once again got it
wrong....

Arno

 

[me]

Your problem sounds somewhat like the XP SP1 USB bug, but you have SP2
installed.

Download the Windows XP USB Update
http://www.softwarepatch.com/windows/winxpusb.html

Patch Available for USB Isochronous Data Transfers Issues
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307271

Also you didn't mention what kind of motherboard and chipset your
computer is running.

Yousuf Khan

As you say, I have SP2 with the latest updates.
Here's the system info -
ASUS A8N5x Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4.
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+
2 x 1GB Corsair DDR 400 SDRAM
ATI AIW Radeon X1900

Jeff

 

[User]

I'm having problems with my newly bought Xcraft RX-3HU USB2 enclosure.

I fitted a new Seagate 250GB Ultra ATA100 hard drive (ST 3250820A).
My system runs WinXP SP2 and the USB2 is integral to the motherboard.
On boot XP sees the drive fine.
I fdisked and formated the drive (NTFS).
I can copy files to and from the drive.

The problem occurs when I copy large files over.
<<snip>>
Any ideas what the problem might be?

Have you tried installing a separate PCI USB2 card and connecting the
drive to it? You can get them for $15-$20. I have resolved several
PC USB2 problems merely by NOT using the onboard port and using a
separate card.

Some of the earlier PC's didn't have the best usb2 logic on the
motherboards.

At any rate for $20, it's an easy cheap test.

 

[me]

Have you tried installing a separate PCI USB2 card and connecting the
drive to it? You can get them for $15-$20. I have resolved several
PC USB2 problems merely by NOT using the onboard port and using a
separate card.

Some of the earlier PC's didn't have the best usb2 logic on the
motherboards.

At any rate for $20, it's an easy cheap test.

I just finished trying it on another system that has a USB2 card. Although it is
running XP SP1 I get exactly the same problems even with a different USB cable.
I have a feeling it's the enclosure itself. I'm waiting for a reply from the
manufacturer at the moment.

 

[Arno Wagner]

I just finished trying it on another system that has a USB2 card. Although it is
running XP SP1 I get exactly the same problems even with a different USB cable.
I have a feeling it's the enclosure itself. I'm waiting for a reply from the
manufacturer at the moment.

That would be bad. Hmm. The try with the different system certainly
leaves only three possible options: The OS, the enclosure or the
disk itself. I would agree the most likely is the enclosure.

BTW, if the cable is bad, you get timeouts, crc errors, short
files, but not file corruption.

Arno

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

That would be bad. Hmm. The try with the different system certainly
leaves only three possible options:

The OS, the enclosure or the disk itself.

I would agree the most likely is the enclosure.

Until you're proven wrong again.

BTW, if the cable is bad, you get timeouts, crc errors,

short files, but not file corruption.

As if short(ened) files aren't corrupted. Babblebot logic.