Intermittent USB ports

[Gerfrek]

I’ve recently started experiencing the problem of external hard drives disconnecting and reconnecting themselves intermittently. As I’m writing this I’m getting the “bing-bing” and “bing-bong” Windows sound of a USB port connecting and disconnecting about every 30 seconds. I’ll probably dream of it tonight. Changing USB ports does not help; this happens on my USB 3 and 2 connections. Also, I’m pretty sure it is not an issue with the external hard drive as this issue happens with any of my four external drives. And the externals work fine on my other machine.

Flash drive sticks work fine and I’m not noticing any issues with my mouse, keyboard or printer. I cannot see anything that is obvious disconnected on my motherboard (an MSI X58A-GD65).

I’m running Windows 7 64 bit with an i7-960.

I cannot really imagine that it is a power issue. According to my UPS software I’m using 120 W and my power supply is rated for 750 W.

As far as I can tell the rest of my machine is running smoothly. My CPU is not burning with the heat of a million suns (it never goes above 40 °C as far as I recall). The same with my graphic card. My hard drive doesn’t have errors.

I’m guessing something is not connecting on my motherboard, something that has to affect all my USB ports. I cannot see any obvious loose connections.

Any advice?
Thanks

 

[D_Know_WD]

Hi there Gerfrek,

Have you tried connecting the drive to the USB ports on the back? They tend to provide more power than those on the front. In case you have Y type of USB cable, you can use that as well. This way, you will see whether your ports could provide enough power.
Another thing you can try is to just update/reinstall your USB drivers which you can find on your MOBO's website.

Cheers,
D_Know_WD

 

[Gerfrek]

Thanks D_Know

I initially became aware of this issue when using the back ports. That’s where my two USB 3 connections live. All of my ports have the same issue, front and back, USB 2 and 3. I’m using the cables that came with the externals. Two of the externals use their own external power supplies.

As far as drivers are concerned, I’m at a bit off a loss at how to see if I have the latest version install. I’ve used my I motherboard manufacturer’s (MSI) “Live Update” utility to check and it says my “mainboard BIOS/drivers/utilities are the latest version. There is no need to update.”

However, in my device manager, I have an ugly yellow warning triangle next to “Marvell 91xx Config ATA Device”. I’ve actually had this since I had the PC built a couple of years ago, with no ill effects. Whatever the case may be, the device status has always been: “The drivers for this device are not installed. (Code 28).” And always when I use the “Update Driver” button, my PC would go through the motions of searching online for software, only to eventually tell me that “Windows has determined the driver software for your device is up to date”.

While I don’t know if my current woes are caused by my “Config ATA Device” I have tried going into Marvell’s driver download page to find the right driver http://www.marvell.com/support/download. There I am asked for part number. Can you perhaps tell me where I should look for this?

SD

 

[D_Know_WD]

I believe this should be a SATA driver.
I guess you can update both your USB 3.0 and Marvel SATA lll drivers from here: http://www.msi.com/support/mb/X58AGD65.html#down-driver&Win7 64

In case the issue persists, you can reset your CMOS: http://www.howtogeek.com/131623/how-to-clear-your-computers-cmos-to-reset-bios-settings/

If this does not help as well, then I guess it may be a good idea to contact the MOBO's manufacturer.

D_Know_WD

 

[WaltzWorker]

USB 2.0 gives up to 500mA of power, whereas the USB 3.0 gives up to 900mA of power. Hopefully the 4(?!?) external drives you have are all externally powered, if not then they could be pulling the power down. If some are externally powered I would suggest trying with attaching one of those at a time. If it's fine, then start attaching the one's that are powered via the USB lines. Or you could try the reverse. Running too many USB devices can always cause problems!

 

[Gerfrek]

No, this issue happens with only one external attached. I've tried my externally powered Lacie and Seagate, as well as my 'internally' powered Lacie and Verbatim (one at a time). I am down to the bare minimum of USB devices of a keyboard, a mouse and the external. I've even tried only going without a keyboard. I believe the Logitech mouse I'm using is not a power hog.

By the way, thanks to D_Know's advice I have been able to finally get rid of that ugly yellow triangle. Unfortunately, neither that, nor resetting my CMOS solved the problem. I am currently on MSI's customer support site, telling them of these issues.

SD

 

[Gerfrek]

Somewhere in the past year and a bit, I have replaced my PSU with a better quality one (one of dem well known brands) and I am not experiencing these issues any more. The old one actually looked like a good quality build, it was fairly dust free and it did not have any loose connections I could see externally. I've always had the idea that a PSU will either work or not work at all. I guess not?