On Mon, Sep 29, 2008 at 9:38 AM, nate <centos at linuxpowered.net> wrote: > Guest wrote: > >> Sorry to double up on your answer like this, but is there any chance that >> the i/o errors are due to a bad usb cable, or usb card in the main >> computer? I didn't mention before that the external hdd that the seagate is >> replacing also reported a lot of i/o errors and kept disconnecting itself, >> which is why I replaced it.... > > Perhaps the drive is spinning down without informing the OS. I recall > an issue last year(?) about some USB drives not behaving properly > and spinning down without informing the OS, then the OS tries to > access them it gets an I/O error. > > All of my 2.5" western digital external USB drives seem to behave > correctly when going into power save mode, have never had an I/O > error as a result of them spinning down. > > nate Revivifying an old thread only long enough to say, somewhat unhelpfully, that all of my USB problems seem to have gone away as a result of my upgrading my kernel to 2.6.27. Unfortunately I am not knowledgeable enough to guess why this is so, but I'm adding a conclusion to my thread as a possible clue for the archive-diver.