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Can't boot off Firewire drive

imrazor

imrazor

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 8, 2010
402
120
Dol Amroth
I have an Iomega Mac Companion that in a previous life had a 3TB drive in it that I've replaced with a 256GB SSD. The drive has Firewire 800 and USB 2.0 interfaces. It will boot off the USB interface, but for the life of me, I can't get it to boot off of Firewire. I've tried holding down the Option key while booting, and the drive does not appear in Firewire mode, but does appear when attached via USB. When connected via Firewire, the drive is visible in the Startup Disk preferences pane, but still will not boot via Firewire.

I have a mid-2007 24" iMac with OS 10.11.5. I've tried resetting the SMC and PRAM, but it still will not boot off Firewire. I'd prefer Firewire 800 booting because the interface is twice the speed of USB. It's still surprisingly snappy even on USB 2.0.

So does anyone have any experience with this enclosure? Does the Iomega FW800 interface just not support booting? Does El Capitan support booting off Firewire? Would downgrading my OS help?
 
hwojtek said:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-r...iewpnt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B003HIXOOQ#R3ARBK99ZT4QU7 - hope it helps.
Click to expand...

That looked promising, but sadly did not work. I tried to boot it with the Alt/Option key held down twice. I tried holding down the key for about two minutes after the boot menu appeared, but the firewire drive never appeared. I then unplugged the Firewire cable, plugged the USB cable in, and the drive popped right up.

EDIT: I took a closer look at the review, and it's actually for something called an Iomega eGo. My drive is an "Iomega Mac Companion".
 
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imrazor said:
So does anyone have any experience with this enclosure? Does the Iomega FW800 interface just not support booting? Does El Capitan support booting off Firewire? Would downgrading my OS help?
Click to expand...

The Iomega FW800 and FW400 both support booting, however, it's likely that your SSD is not compatible with the FW interface in that enclosure. I don't believe downgrading OS X will resolve the problem.
 
chscag said:
The Iomega FW800 and FW400 both support booting, however, it's likely that your SSD is not compatible with the FW interface in that enclosure. I don't believe downgrading OS X will resolve the problem.
Click to expand...
That sounds so odd. If the SSD is bootable via USB, why would it not be bootable for Firewire? Do you really think if I dropped a spinning platter into the enclosure it would boot? Doesn't the Mac just see a drive (whether HD or SSD) as a block device?
 
Absolutely.
I highly doubt there is an issue with the drive itself.
Two things that I stumbled upon in regards of Iomega is that in general they do not seem happy with FW booting. The other thing is that somebody had a success with FW booting when the USB cable was unplugged from Iomega enclosure (unplugging on the Mac side didn't signal the enclosure to switch to FW).
 
OP:
Sometimes certain hardware is just "not compatible" with -other- hardware, no matter what one tries to do about it.

My advice:
Can you boot the external using USB?
Yes, I realize it's only USB2.
However -- even though the actual boot-up may take longer, things will probably run pretty quickly once you're "up-and-running".

Sometimes the only option is to "go with what works" ...
 
If you plug it in via Firewire to a Mac that is already booted, does it show? Is it possible the firewire chip is blown?
 
The drive is visible via Firewire connection, it just won't boot over FW. It *will* boot via USB 2.0. The results aren't bad at all. Boot time is not that much better than the internal drive, but apps start a lot faster and I don't get the spinning beachball of doom nearly as much. But Firewire 800 is nearly twice as fast, and I'd like to get the speed this enclosure is rated for.

EDIT: I've also made sure that the USB cable is unplugged from the enclosure when trying to boot over FW800.
 
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After I good bit of Googling I found this article: http://blog.poettner.de/2012/01/22/external-firewire-800-hard-drive-comparison/
It seems to confirm what I've found: my enclosure simply will not boot via Firewire. That's a real disappointment. I'd return the enclosure if I could, but it isn't worth the cost of return postage.

Can anyone suggest a low-cost Firewire 800 enclosure that is known to be bootable?
 
I had to go look for the very same putty knife I used for opening my first Mac Mini, but it handled the task in an excellent way. The body is surprisingly flexible, so even I couldn't break it. The best way was to use the putty knife inch by inch AND simultaneously block the silver part of the enclosure from locking on back again to the white part. On a scale 1-10 it's about 3 to 4.
 
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