IMac :: External Hard Drives & Sleep Mode
Feb 22, 2010
Is it possible to have an external HDD connected to an iMac or Mac Mini on a regular basis? I have a Power Mac G4, and it's always had issues with going into sleep mode when there is any external storage connected via the USB 2.0 ports (and I've put in replacement ports to try and remedy this, to no avail). The main problem is that once the system wakes up, it thinks you've improperly removed the device. Apple told me, way back, that this was normal and to just eject all external storage before going into sleep mode. Which is a pain, but looking at a new desktop Mac I would like to just get the tiny, base HDD and use a beefy external for all my media - unless this is still an acceptable norm with new macs.
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Sep 17, 2010
I installed two SSD drives into my 27" i7, one in the SSD location and one replacing the optical drive. So I have two SSD's (128GB + 256GB) and the stock WD 1TB drive.
My issue is once I put the machine in sleep mode, the iMac is ejecting the SSD's. If I boot off of the hard drive and then put it in sleep mode, I will drop both SSD's. If I boot off of one of the SSD's and put it in sleep mode, the SSD that was used for booting will not be ejected, but the other one will.
Anyone else running multiple SSD's (not in raid) and is having the same issue? I am beginning to think that I will have to live with just one SSD as the boot drive (which is not the end of the world). Or, cough up an extra $540 (not likely) for another 256GB SSD and raid 0 two of them as boot drives.
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Jan 10, 2009
Just purchased and hooked up a WD 2tb MyBook Studio Edition II external HD, the drive spins down on the HD but my iMac doesnt sleep while its plugged in.
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Jun 19, 2014
When my iMac 27" is in sleep mode I have noticed that the hard drive spins up very regularly every 4 or 5 minutes. Also when placed in sleep, the monitor takes about 30 seconds to go black. It also wakes on its own for no apparent reason. No new software has been added, only normal updates, running Lion. Time machine backup is done every couple weeks.
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Dec 21, 2009
I just had the original 300 GB hard drive fail in my aluminum 24" inch iMac running the latest update of Leopard. I wasn't able to save it using diskwarrior (diskwarrior said it was some sort of mechanical failure) but I was able to recover most of the data from it by booting from an external hard-drive.
So I went out and purchased a brand new Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB drive. The install went fine, it found the drive partitioned it and installed Leopard successful. Then is crashed and disappeared when I left it alone to run all the software updates. I came back and the computer was stuck on "Restart Required" after downloading all the updates. I went to hit restart now, and the system just hanged, wouldn't do anything. So I hard powered down the system and restarted it. It came up with nothing, just stuck on the White Screen of Death. So I plugged the external drive back in and booted from it. Mac OSX couldn't find the drive and diskwarrior would crash if I tried to run it. I tried to boot up from the OSX start-up disk and it couldn't find the drive either.
So I took the case apart and made sure all the connections were solid and the drive was mounted correctly. Everything looked fine so I plugged it in and it started up fine. Finished the updates and the iMac ran great.
So I thought maybe it was overheating, so I've installed smcfancontrol and started to monitor the temp of the drive. I also took the mac apart again and sucked out any dust in the fans or vents. The drive never goes over a 105 F, so it doesn't seem to be overheating.
However, this is where the problem is consistent: everytime the iMac goes into sleep mode, it crashes and the iMac is unable to find the hard-drive again. Unless I unplug it completely for 5 minutes or so. Once I unplug it, it finds the drive and operates like a champ.
I think maybe there's an issue powering the drive back on? Anyone have any ideas?
And my follow up posting later that day:
Quote:
So I ran some tests just to see if was an overheat issue, hard drive malfunction, or sleep issue. I decided to start encoding a video, pulled up Word, Power Point, Excel, started downloading all 6000 mail messages off my server (I never delete my e-mail :-/), also started installing iLife 09, and pulled up a bunch of webpages in Firefox with multiple tabs.
However, I shut off all sleep mode options on the hard drive. I let it run for an hour and came back. Everything is fine, hard drive isn't locked up and smcfancontrol shows the hard drive running pretty hot (115 degrees) but not so hot I'm worried. So it's definitely something to do the hard drives going into sleep mode and not powering back on. It's also weird that I have to leave the computer completely unplugged for 10-15 minutes before the drive is recognized again.
So turning off sleep seems to be my work-around, however, this shouldn't be a long term solution. I'm worried that there is a bigger issue with the iMac, but I'm not sure what would cause this. I've been a PC guy for years, this was my first Mac, and honestly I don't know enough about the inner workings to narrow this down. I would assume this would have to do with the motherboard in some way? But I'm not sure how you would even test it.
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Apr 19, 2010
I was done doing various tasks on the iMac and when I decided to plug in the external hard drive for a Time Machine backup, the drive spun, but was never shown on the desktop.I also tried another external drive and had the same thing happen.
After rebooting (hey, this sounds like Windows!), the drive again showed up on the desktop and Time Machine worked fine.Is an external hard drive not showing up on the desktop a somewhat common issue?
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Mar 3, 2010
I have a fairly new iMac that I upgraded to Snow Leopard a few months ago. It seemed to me that prior to that my external HD worked fine with Time Machine. Since then it is recognized for a short period of time when I connect it, then it disappears. I replaced it with a WD My Book. It worked perfectly for a month and now it has shut down. Has anybody had run into this before? I can't believe that every hard drive fails within a month in the same mysterious way!
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Mar 30, 2012
My iMAC will not find my external hard drives.
Info:
iMac (27-inch Mid 2011), Mac OS X (10.7.3)
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May 25, 2012
I am a photographer. My Mac Tower and Macbook Pros display my external hard drives on the desktop. That makes workflow so much easier. I just purchased an I-Mac and have to access the external HDs through the menu. how I can display the icons for the external HDs on my desktop?
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Oct 6, 2009
I'm running out of space on my Mac Mini's disk because of all my iTunes video files. I am thinking about buying an enclosure for my spare 1 TB hard drive, and using it as the location of my iTunes library, but I wondered how it works with the Mac Mini's energy-savings mode. My Mini is set to sleep after 15 minutes of inactivity, then wake when iTunes content is requested by my Apple TV or Airport Express. I like it, because it's very energy efficient that way! My question is, will the disks also sleep along with my computer, and will they wake properly when the computer wakes?
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Nov 30, 2014
My iMac wake unexpectedly from sleep mode then goes back to sleep 00:10-00:15 later. Yosemite is current.
Info:
iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)
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Aug 23, 2009
I'm having a problem with my PowerBook G4 where is goes into sleep mode at random times. Mostly when I am streaming video..or at times the fan comes on, it sounds super high then boom. sleep mode again. After hitting the space bar, it comes back on, but it'll happen again shortly after. I've played with the sleep settings
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Dec 29, 2009
As of last night, my MBP started acting very strangely. After entering my username and password, it would enter the desktop for a short period of time and then kick back into sleep mode; the screen would turn back to black. Sometimes it will let me stay on the desktop for a long time and other times it will hardly let me stay on the desktop. I called apple support and they had me start the computer in safe mode; even then it occasionally kicks me out.
The tech guy said that it was a "strange software issue" and not a hardware issue. I thought it was a hard drive issue; my hard drive makes an odd sound when it unlocks (a grinding sound), but it has been doing that for quite some time with no issues. I tried to reset the SMC and it didn't do anything.
How should I remedy this problem? Is this a hard drive issue? Hard drive failure? Has the grinding sound finally caught up with me? I am running OS X; not leopard or snow leopard. I know I need to upgrade, but this shouldn't be happening.
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Jan 6, 2010
I recently purchased a WD My Book Studio 1TB to use as back-up drive, using Time Machine.
After my iMac (Intel 2007 - Leopard) wakes from "Sleep Mode", the WD My Book is always dismounted so, unable to perform the Back-up ? I have to manually mount the drive before manually performing the back-up.
How can I keep my WD HardDrive mounted at all time, even after Sleep mode, so the Time Machine Editor automatic weekly back-up works ? Interface is FW800.
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Jun 11, 2010
I have just seen another thread here which links to the following Apple KB article about running in clamshell mode. [URL]. It says something about putting your laptop to sleep before removing the external monitor. I am not running in clamshell mode but I have a dual screen setup using a Mini DisplayPort to VGA adapter. When I take my MBP (2010 - see sig) off my desk, do I need to put it to sleep to remove the Mini DisplayPort connector, and, if so, does anyone know why this is necessary?
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Dec 19, 2008
I have a new MacBook, 2.4GHz, 2 GB DDR, that has replaced my iBook G3 after the HD went out. May it RIP. Sometimes when I close the lid at work and put it in the computerbag it will be quite warm when I get it out. Sometimes it won't come out of sleep and I have to do a hard boot. What causes this and whats the remedy?
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Oct 3, 2010
Lately I've noticed that whenever I put my Mac to sleep, I lose a few megabytes. At first I didn't think anything about it. Until one day I let sleep for a while I was doing something, and came back to, and saw that I had lost about 300 megabytes. While it was in sleep, no applications were running and nothing was downloading. My mac is Macbook pro, 3 years old, 120 gigabyte, 2 gb of ram, 2.33 Ghz Intel Core duo, Model Identifier: 2,2, and Serial Number:W86481HGW0H Right now it's running leopard. I'm about to upgrade to Snow Leopard. So why would it lose this hard drive space when it's in sleep mode? By the way, I bought it used one year ago. So I've only had it a year. I haven't downloaded anything from any untrustworthy websites. I only download things from trusted sources(i.e. itunes.) Please help. Right now my only solution is to keep a close eye on it, and make sure that it does not go to sleep!
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Aug 21, 2009
I put it on Craig's list so wanted to wipe the drive and figure I'd play around with OS 9 a little just for fun. While in OS 9 it prompted me to upgrade the firmware on the DVD-ROM drive. I thought that sounded like a good idea since it makes some terrible noises when a disc is in... anyway, I did the firmware upgrade and everything went fine. That's the only real change I can think of that might have contributed to this new issue.Anyway, after that I put 10.3 on it again (I had 10.4 on it before) and it wouldn't sleep correctly. Everything looks like its going to sleep ok, then the hard drive spins up, then back down, over and over again endlessly.
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Mar 27, 2012
My parents just bought a new Imac (3.4 Ghz/I7) which is running 10.6.8. and we cannot figure out why it won't go to sleep automatically. In System Preferences/Engergy Saver we have set both the "computer sleep" and "display sleep" to about 5 minutes, but no matter what we do it keeps showig the screen saver and never goes to sleep. The "put hd to sleep" is checked, and the start screen saver is set to roughly the same amount... I have tried adjusting these settings, to no avail.
Info:
Mac OS, Mac OS X (10.6.7)
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Mar 8, 2012
I have a new iMac OS 10.7.3 I am using a SeaGate 1.5 TB external HD for backup.
If I leave the computer on continous everything works fine. It backs up every hour. It has been running fine for over a week. If I set the iMac in energy saver mode, say 10 minutes, when the iMac comes out of sleep mode there is a warning that Time Machine failed.
I get the following errors messages: "Time Machine could not complete the Backup" "Error while creating the Backup Folder"
There is no way to correct it or retry. I have to run disk utility and erase the external HD, re-format, then back everything again.
I would prefer to use the energy save feature of the iMac if I could. I tried the Apple Support number and they just said leave the iMac in "energy saver NEVER" so the iMac stays on continous.
Anyone able to let their IMac go in sleep mode with Time Machine turned on? It seems like a possible bug with 10.7.3?
Info:
iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.3)
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Jun 4, 2014
I am currently am using a MacBook Pro mid 2007 and was wondering it is possible to connect it to an external monitor and if so use it when closed without the comp going into sleep mode.
Info:
MacBook Pro
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Feb 19, 2012
My iMac keeps going into sleep mode (at least that what it looks like) for no apparent reason.
By "sleep mode" I mean the screen goes black, the sleep light fades on and off, as if it were in sleep mode, and the fan shuts off. When I press enter, it turns back on and the fan turns on very hight and loud.
Mac OSX 10.5.8
2.1 GHz, PowerPC G5
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Mar 22, 2012
I am Running a 2.8Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo 24" iMac running Mac OS X 10.7.3. I run time machine to backup to an external Seagate 3TB, FreeAgent GoFlex Desk, FireWire Drive. When the Mac goes into sleep mode, the Seagate drive un-mounts. When the Mac wakes up, I get an error that the drive was not properly disconnected and the drive is no longer mounted. The only way I can get the drive to remount, is to remove power from the drive for several seconds and then reconnect it.
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Jan 25, 2009
I have a Imac 20 with a small 3.5 hard drive and I have bought a bigger 360 gig 3.5 hard drive to replace the old one. I have the new one in an external case with USB 2.0 right now. Is there some way I can transfer the entire contents of the old hard drive on to the new one and then swap out the old drive with the new drive and not miss a beat?
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Nov 30, 2006
My iMac G5 (rev A) shuts down immediately after i put it to sleep mode after just starting up the computer. The longer the computer has been on before I put it to sleep, the longer it takes for the computer to shut down while in sleep mode. I already did the hardware test and it said there were no problems.
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Mar 26, 2009
I'm downloading a long patch for World of Warcraft, and I want my iMac to stop burning up so much Heat! Can I 'half' turn it off or something - so that it keeps downloading but relaxes and cools down?
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Nov 21, 2009
When Imac is in sleep mode, does it still drain the AA batteries?
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Aug 18, 2010
It happens from time to time when I put the computer into sleep mode and let it sit overnight.
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Mar 5, 2009
My iMac G5 (OSX 10.4) starts up as normal, runs for about 5 minutes and then automatically goes to sleep. It will wake up if prompted, but every time it goes back to sleep in seconds. If left in sleep mode for a few minutes it will wake up again for 1 � 5 minutes before once again automatically returning to sleep.
It is definitely not due to hot corners. I changed the power saver settings several times, restarted and also reset the SMU but with no luck. I�ve also ran an apple hardware test which got the fallowing error code: �2FAN/4/8: CPU Fan�
Anything else I can try besides taking it in to an Apple service provider?
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Jun 2, 2012
My iMac is some 2 years old and have never had this problem before but twice in the last week it has failed to awake from sleep mode and I have had to hold the start button to 'wake' it up. It then goes through the usual procedure that transpires afte 'logging off'
Info:
AppleTV 2, Mac OS X (10.7.3), I have an o2 router
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